Coach Yourself to Success: 101 Tips from a Personal Coach for Reaching Your Goals at Work and in Life

By Talane Miedaner

"In just six months I have gained tremendous clarity about how to care for my needs, live my values, and create my ideal life."
--Pat Thomas, vice president, product delivery, AT&T

"This book is your blueprint for the life you've always dreamed about having."
--Sandy Vilas, president, Coach University

Olympic athletes have a coach. CEOs use the services of an executive coach. Can you imagine how much more productive and successful you would be if you had your own life coach? You don't have to anymore! In Coach Yourself to Success, Talane Miedaner, one of the most widely recognized personal coaches in the world, provides you with the latest technology for achieving success and attracting everything you have always wanted.

Using her experience as a professional coach for hundreds of Fortune 500 clients and her own corporate background, Talane shares 101 of the most powerful and effective coaching tips and presents them in an easy-to-follow, 10-part program. Coach Yourself to Success will help you gain insight into what is truly important in your life and give you the edge to take yourself from ordinary to extraordinary.

• Language: English
• Publisher: McGraw-Hill Education
• Release date: Nov 21, 2014
• ISBN: 9780071837576

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PART ONE

INCREASE YOUR NATURAL POWER

There is a vitality, a life force, an energy, a quickening, that is translated through you into action, and because there is only one of you in all time, this expression is unique. And if you block it, it will never exist through any other medium and will be lost.

MARTHA GRAHAM

Powerful people have the ability to get what they want, to attract great opportunities, people, and wealth, and to wield their influence to impact those around them. We are all powerful to varying degrees, but everyone can increase his or her own natural power and have more energy. The formula is a simple one: to increase your natural power, eliminate the things that drain your energy and add the things that give you energy. I said simple, not necessarily easy. The first place to start when you begin this coaching program is to dramatically reduce the number of things that are distracting you and draining your energy, and replace them with some positive, nurturing energy boosters. This is where you get your life in good shape, get rid of the bad habits, and learn how to protect yourself from unpleasant people and remarks. This is the underlying foundation needed to increase your power naturally and attract the success you want. We often neglect to build a solid foundation for our lives because we are so busy going after our goals.

There are a couple of dangers in going after really big goals before you’ve taken the time to get your life in basic order. First, you may achieve your goal, but it may not last. You’ve probably seen it happen to friends who sacrifice all to go for their goal and achieve it, only to find the success short-lived and their lives in shambles. Most people erroneously conclude that success ruins people, but in fact, it may not be the success that ruins people, but rather the lack of a solid foundation. Any work you do in this first section will strengthen your personal foundation and make all the following steps of this book much easier to accomplish. While these tips may look simple, take the time to do them. It is critical to achieving long-term, sustainable success.

The second danger in going after your goals before establishing a strong foundation is that you may reach your goals and then not feel fulfilled or satisfied. A reporter once asked me, What is the number one reason people are unable to reach their goals? I simply told her it was that they picked the wrong goals in the first place.

Have you ever had your heart set on some objective and then, when you finally achieved it, found that your victory was hollow? Either what you wanted wasn’t as great as you had imagined, or you enjoyed it for a short time and then went all too quickly on to the next goal. This is extremely common. We are so heavily influenced by media and advertising that we often don’t know what we really want as individuals. Instead, we adopt some media-inspired vision of what will make us happy. What you think you want may not be your true dreams or goals; instead, you may have been seduced into them by slick advertising. Obviously, reaching these goals will still leave you with those vague feelings of discontent. Before you can even figure out what makes you really happy, you need to handle the basics in life.

Start energizing your life by getting rid of everything you are putting up with. Cleaning out your closet and sewing on a button may not sound glamorous, but these kinds of things are often the first step to getting what you really want. As Mom always said, Eat your veggies; then you can have dessert.

TIP 1

ELIMINATE ALL THOSE PETTY ANNOYANCES

To be really great in the little things, to be truly noble and heroic in the insipid details of everyday life, is a virtue so rare as to be worthy of canonization.

HARRIET BEECHER STOWE

If you are serious about being successful, start by eliminating everything you are putting up with, the things you are tolerating or enduring—those petty annoyances. You might be tolerating any number of small things, such as the overflowing in-box, the unpaid taxes you have to figure out, or even the tear in your bathrobe that nags at you every time you open your shower door and see it hanging there. Every time you see it, you think, I’ve got to sew that. That is an annoyance. It could be that you are also tolerating something bigger. Maybe you’re tolerating a coworker’s habit of always showing up late, or you’re tolerating your boss who micromanages you. You could even be tolerating your own bad habits—such as biting your nails or never being able to find important papers because your files are disorganized.

Everything you are tolerating drains your energy, makes you irritable, and wears you down. It is very difficult to be successful if you are putting up with so many annoyances. From my coaching experience, I’ve found that most people are currently tolerating anywhere from 60 to 100 different things. The first step to eliminating what you are putting up with is to make a list. It doesn’t do any good to just keep a mental list; you must write these annoyances down onto paper to get them out of your head. Then set aside a Saturday or Sunday as a blitz day and start working through your list, resolving anything that can be done in one day. If you start to lose steam, take a break or call a friend to check in for a pep talk and report your progress. It helps to set a deadline. After the blitz day treat yourself to any reward that would motivate you—perhaps a massage or a dinner out.

You won’t be able to handle some of these annoyances in one day, so give yourself one to three months. You might find it more fun to work on this with a friend and make it a contest—whoever eliminates the most items in 90 days wins a special prize. Petty annoyances drain your energy, reducing your natural ability to attract success. Don’t sweat the small things. Just get them out of your life. As for the things that seem impossible to handle—like your boss, the long commute to work, or the pollution in your city—just write them on the list and don’t worry about them. The solutions will come to you in time.

Take the example of Jason, a successful portfolio manager on Wall Street. Jason loved the financial world but was extremely frustrated in his work, where he seemed to be putting in long hours day after day. He had been in the same position for over seven years and felt he wasn’t getting the recognition or salary he deserved. Jason said to me, I feel like a rat on a treadmill. I keep running faster and faster and working harder and harder, and it is getting me absolutely nowhere. What do I do? I asked Jason to list all the things he was currently tolerating about his life, both personally and professionally. He came back with a fairly long list that seemed endless to him. Like many unhappy people, he was stuck. I said, Jason, it’s time to start taking excellent care of yourself. I suggested that he begin rewarding himself, doing some things he especially liked even when all the paperwork wasn’t finished. He needed to stop pushing so hard for a few minutes and rest. The result was gratifying. One day he went for a walk in Central Park and watched the sunset—a simple thing that he really enjoyed but hadn’t taken the time to do in years. He started taking a martial arts class—something he had always wanted to do, but just couldn’t seem to justify the time for. Now Jason had something to look forward to after work, and he found himself getting his work done more efficiently so he could go to his classes. He cleaned up all the papers on his desk and caulked the tub, and things began to turn around. Jason talked to a recruiter about job prospects, and within two months, he had a new job at another investment bank where he felt more valued and received a $30,000 increase in salary. Not to mention the fact that he started dating again.

Some people sit down to write their list and have great trouble getting started. In 99 percent of the cases, this isn’t because they don’t have any pesky annoyances in their lives, but rather because they are so numb to them that they can’t even think of them. If this happens to you, it may help to think of the different categories of things you tolerate—what are you tolerating about work, home, your friends and family, your pets, your body, your own habits? Start there and your list may be easier to form.

The next trick is to lump the things you are tolerating together and see how you could eliminate a whole bunch of them at once. For example, John was tolerating not making enough money, a messy desk at work, his boss, not having enough responsibility, and not getting enough acknowledgment, among other things. He realized that if he got a different job, he would wipe out a whole pack of annoyances at once. He cleaned off his desk and then talked to his boss about the possibilities of working in another department where he would have more responsibilities. He got the transfer and a few months later earned a salary increase to match his increased responsibilities.

You may find that you are putting up with something for a very good reason. One of my clients, Jessica, worked excessively to eliminate her entire list of 89 annoyances. She was very proud of her accomplishment but was a bit discouraged on our next call. Now that she had eliminated all of the piddling stuff that had been bothering her, she realized the big one that was staring her in the face—she was having trouble in her marriage of 27 years. She had been hiding from the fact that the relationship wasn’t working, even though she knew she’d have to deal with it if she was to be successful in her business and happy in her life. All the little things she had been tolerating distracted her from the big issues in her life.

When you finish your list, you will find that a number of things seem beyond your control and you don’t know how to fix them. Not to worry; just leave them on the list and work on the ones you can do something about now. I gave this assignment to my sister before I realized it wasn’t advisable to coach one’s own family. She made her list and showed it to me, and when I told her I was sorry, I shouldn’t coach her, she never pursued it. One of the items on her list was her cubicle mate at work. Without doing anything, she was given a different partner a month later. You will find that if you write your list, stuff it in a drawer and come back to it a month later, you’ll be able to cross some things off even though you weren’t working on them. So whatever you do, at least get started and write the darn list!

TIP 2

PLUG THE ENERGY DRAINS

Cocaine habit forming? Of course not. I ought to know. I’ve been using it for years.

TALLULAH BANKHEAD

Once you start eliminating what you are putting up with (Tip 1), you will see just how much energy those petty annoyances were taking from you. Just like the hum of an air conditioner: you don’t realize how loud it really is until you turn it off. Lots of things drain our precious energy. Take TV, for example. When was the last time you felt zippy and alive after watching TV? Tabloid papers have a lot of negative and gossipy news that can drain your energy. Needy relationships will take up inordinate amounts of your time and energy. As will any and all addictions, including alcohol, sugar, shopping, computer games, caffeine, gambling, smoking, chocolate—you know which ones are yours. I’m not saying you can’t have a cup of coffee once in a while, but more than three cups a week, and it may be an addiction.

I didn’t think I was addicted to coffee. I didn’t even like it that much and only had one cup every morning. When I decided to give it up, I thought it would be easy. After three days of skull-splitting, mind-numbing headaches (and I don’t usually get headaches), I realized this was a powerful drug, not just a nice cup of coffee. Try it yourself and see. (Plus, if you are interested in losing weight, studies show that caffeine causes insulin production to go up, which increases fat storage.) Now that I’ve given up caffeine, my energy is more even and balanced throughout the day, and I don’t buzz around in the morning thinking that I’ve accomplished a lot when I actually haven’t. Feeling stressed, under the gun? Definitely not the time for coffee. It will make things worse, exacerbating the stress you already feel. One client, formerly a coffee aficionado, swears by this technique coming off the caffeine habit: cut coffee out, but drink as much black or green tea as you want for one month and then switch to herbal tea. He finds he now has more energy and feels much more relaxed.

Another client, a senior editor at a publishing house, was addicted to sugar and found herself heading toward the vending machine a couple of times a day. She decided to quit cold turkey. Any time she felt inclined to head to the vending machines for a candy bar and a coke, she just told herself, Sugar isn’t going to help. In fact, it will just make things worse. This mantra worked for her. Sugar was a way for her to get a quick energy burst, and it was also a way to put off work on a difficult project. Instead she focused on the task at hand or addressed the project head-on. Not only did she lose weight, but she discovered that she was even more productive at work.

What are the seductive energy drains in your life? Don’t be shy about getting support. There are all sorts of excellent 12-step programs that help people get over their addictions—CODA for codependency issues, AA for alcohol, AlAnon for family members of alcoholics, OA for overeaters. There is something for everyone. Get the support you need to eliminate this energy drain once and for all. If you think you can manage your addictions on your own, make a list and eliminate one each month until you are free.

Addictions take over your life and are extremely difficult to stop on your own. If you try doing it on your own and fail, do not despair. This does not mean that you have no willpower or are a weak and terrible person. Stop beating yourself up about it. All it means is that you really are addicted and the only thing missing is a really powerful support system to help you break free.

TIP 3

INSTALL 10 DAILY HABITS

Good habits, which bring our lower passions and appetites under automatic control, leave our natures free to explore the larger experiences of life. Too many of us divide and dissipate our energies in debating actions which should be taken for granted.

RALPH W. SOCKMAN

Most of us have a few bad habits that don’t really nurture and support us. They may even have evolved from a habit to an addiction, as my daily cup of coffee did before I even realized it. Experts say that to break a habit, you need to replace it with a different habit, or you might go right back to the old habit. Ideally you want to replace a bad habit with a good habit—good meaning that it gives you energy rather than depletes it. Developing a new habit is like installing a new software program—once you do the initial implementation it works automatically (with occasional upgrades) and you don’t need to think about it. The beauty of a habit is also the curse, making bad habits hard to break precisely because they are now installed in your brain.

What are 10 pleasures that you could put in place on a daily basis that you’d look forward to doing? Perhaps you’d like to spend 15 minutes of quiet time to plan your day or on creative thought? How about stretching for 10 minutes after you get home from work to get the kinks out? Maybe you want to walk or bike to work instead of driving. Try bringing your lunch with you to work and eating outside under a tree instead of in the cafeteria. Experiment with going to bed a half-hour earlier and getting up a half-hour earlier.

The idea here is not to put in place a should habit—something you think you should do—but rather a habit you’d love to do—something that would be a treat for you.

This will be different for each person. Most people are so stressed out when they begin this assignment that they can’t even think of 10 pleasurable habits. This was true for me. I had completely lost touch with what I enjoyed doing. I couldn’t think of anything except shoulds like, I should exercise daily, or, I should eat more veggies. This didn’t light me up or turn me on so, I had to think back to what I used to do for fun. My list of 10 daily habits ended up as a combination of some fun things and some things I knew I needed to implement on a regular basis:

1. Walk to work instead of taking the subway. (I timed it and found that the subway took 40 minutes, and I could walk door to door in one hour. I figured for an extra 20 minutes, I’d gain an hour of exercise and save some money. This ended up becoming a sort of walking meditation for me.)

2. Floss daily (sort of a should, but I don’t mind flossing, and it definitely makes my teeth happy).

3. Call a friend or send a note of thanks daily.

4. Eat an exotic fresh fruit (raspberries, strawberries, a mango, a papaya, a juicy pear).

5. Do one pamper me thing (a new book, a walk in the park, fresh flowers for the office).

6. Take vitamin C and a multivitamin (a pretty easy one).

7. Do daily back exercises (I had lower back pain, and these kept me mobile).

8. Tell someone I love you every day.

9. Spend 15 minutes to plan my day every morning.

10. Clean my desk off before leaving the office every evening.

If you are having trouble breaking a bad habit or starting a good habit, you may want to create a visual display to chart your progress. It doesn’t really matter what you use as a visual display, but you need some daily visual reminder to keep you on target such as the gold star method discussed below. Some clients cut out pictures from magazines and create a collage that inspires them to stick to their new habits.

This may sound silly, but it really helps to have some sort of visual display or to make a mini-contest or game out of it. Kendall, an athletic client of mine, was addicted to sugar and decided to give herself a gold star for every day without sugar. She didn’t want to see a blank day on the calendar. The visual display not only shows you in black and white just how well you’ve really done, but it motivates you to keep on going. The longer you go, the more powerful it becomes. This technique also works for implementing a good habit, like walking the dog or eating three fresh vegetables a day. The latest research on habits says that while it may only take 21 days to establish a new, simple habit, such as taking vitamin C every day at breakfast, some habits are much more difficult to install, especially if they are related to changing eating habits and starting exercise. Be prepared to give yourself more time and get additional support when making bigger changes.

One of the easiest ways to incorporate a new habit into your life is a technique called laddering, in which you take an existing habit or routine and then add the new habit to it. For example, if you are already brushing your teeth, you can attach the new habit of flossing to that existing habit. Put a reminder note on your bathroom mirror and put the floss right next to your toothbrush until it is automatic. If you already eat breakfast, put the jar of multivitamins right next to your cups so that you’ll remember to add in the multivitamin habit each day. If you are in the habit of driving to work, add the habit of tossing in your gym bag in the morning so you can stop by the gym on the way home from work. Put the gym bag by the front door so you remember. A combination of visual reminders attached to an existing habit, and you’ll soon be on autopilot.

Adding in exercise is a hard one for most people. The secret is finding someone to do it with you, especially if you are an extroverted type. Often, we just need some extra support while establishing the new habit.

One client, a super busy construction executive, realized he’s never been able to find time for exercise in his day because he would always find work to do instead. He was used to working with a strict schedule, so he called a personal trainer to come to his house and get a workout in before work. (Another example of using laddering successfully—he had the habit of checking his schedule every day and going to appointments so he used that existing habit to add in the appointment for exercise). Now that it is a routine, he has the trainer come only one time a week instead of the initial three times a week because he is in the habit of daily exercise. Don’t be afraid to hire help to get yourself going, because you’ll soon find you can do it on your own with occasional check-ins to keep you on target.

Another important point about implementing a new habit—it is much easier to get started if it is a daily action. It is very hard to remember to do something three times a week, which is the standard advice for exercise. You are much better off walking every day for 10 minutes to get the habit started than walking three times a week for 30 minutes. Gradually increase your time each day, and before you know it, you’ll be walking 30 to 60 minutes a day. Find someone to join you, and you’ll be more likely to stick with it.

Write down a list of 10 daily pleasures and start enjoying every day.

TIP 4

ELIMINATE THE SHOULDS

To be good, according to the vulgar standard of goodness, is obviously quite easy. It merely requires a certain amount of sordid terror, a certain lack of imaginative thought, and a certain low passion for middle-class respectability.

OSCAR WILDE

The shoulds are those things we think we have to do, gotta do, but don’t really want to do. For example, I should network more. I should take Spanish classes to improve my résumé. I should be making more money. I should exercise. I should do this, that, or the other thing. All these "shoulds" are weighing you down and keeping you from getting on with the really interesting stuff in your life. I’m sure you could make up a nice little list of shoulds right now and I recommend that you do. Now crumple it up, wad it into a ball, and burn it!

It is time to ditch the shoulds. They are getting you nowhere and sapping your precious life energy.

How can you tell if something is a real goal or a should goal? Well, one sure-fire way is to ask yourself, How old is this goal? If you’ve had it for a year or more, then it is a should goal that is completely lifeless. You don’t want that dead goal hanging around one minute longer. Get rid of it! And I mean now! Ah, but you protest, If I give up my goal to lose weight, then I’ll never lose weight. Well, that may be true, but you’ve been saying you need to lose weight for how many years now? I don’t think this is ever going to happen, so you might as well give it up and replace it with something that you are really interested in doing. At this suggestion, a few of my clients gleefully get rid of the old goal, but most want to keep it. It’s amazing how attached we get to these shoulds. If you still feel that you want to hang onto a certain goal, then I say it is time to expand it into one that will get you excited. For example, instead of focusing on losing weight, how about setting a goal to become a yoga instructor or enter a dance competition? This should goal is suddenly a whole lot more fun, full of life, and will very likely have the side benefit of weight loss. If you really can’t toss a should, then transform it or delegating it.

Suppose you think you should get a better job, but just haven’t gotten motivated yet. Update your résumé (you can even hire an expert to do this for you), get it to a headhunter, and let him or her find you a new job. If you aren’t ready to update your résumé, network, contact a recruiter, or go on interviews, then you may as well forget this goal too. Far better to delete and move on. You’ll feel much lighter immediately.

Sandy, a 45-year-old social worker, hired me because she had recently divorced and wanted to find a new man. She wanted to start working out and to lose weight, but she just couldn’t seem to get started. She would go to the gym sporadically, but it wasn’t enough. Sandy blamed herself for a lack of discipline and willpower. I suggested that willpower was entirely unnecessary if she had an effective structure for support. I encouraged her to set up a support system that would make it easy for her to work out.

She was a very conscientious person, and I knew that if she had an appointment to meet a friend at the gym, she wouldn’t miss it. She put her gym bag in the car so she’d be able to go directly after work, because she knew herself well enough to know that if she went home first, she’d never make it back out again. Sandy made an appointment with a girlfriend who was also committed to getting back in shape. They met at the gym and ended up doing 35 minutes of exercise. Sandy felt terrific. Her colleagues at work noticed her enthusiasm, and one particularly handsome man asked her if she’d like to go running together. One thing led to another, and soon Sandy not only lost eight pounds, but she had a new relationship.

Mark really felt that he should work the room at business functions, but it made him feel really awkward and uncomfortable because he hated small talk. I suggested he sit down with a drink and let people approach him instead. Far better to have one or two rewarding conversations than shake hands with a bunch of folks you’ll never remember afterwards.

What are your tired old goals? If you haven’t done anything about them in the past year, get rid of them or reinvent them. Remember, you can always pick them up again later, but give yourself a break and let go of that burden for now. Another client, Howard, gave up his weight loss goals and took up tai chi instead. I met him for lunch a few months later and even though he wasn’t any thinner, he looked more relaxed, confident, and attractive. Why struggle if it isn’t making a difference anyway?

My client, Jim, was a dynamic mortgage broker and a great list-maker. Every year he would make an astonishing number of New Year’s resolutions. This year, he showed me his list of 25 goals, and I asked him to review it for any goals over a year old and delete any shoulds. He pared the list down to four key goals that he was really excited about working on and then felt a surprising relief. Get rid of the dead goals and those shoulds now, as they will only slow you down the rest of the year.

TIP 5

ESTABLISH BIG BOUNDARIES

The way in which a person loses their true goodness is just like the way that trees are destroyed by the ax. Cut down day after day, how can the mind, any more than the tree, retain its beauty or continue to live.

MENCIUS, FOURTH CENTURY, BC

It is almost impossible to be successful without firm and clear boundaries. We naturally respect people who have strong boundaries. Boundaries are simply the things people can’t do to you, lines that will protect you and allow you to be your best. For example, most people have in place the boundary that it is not okay for anyone to hit them. Now we know that some folks don’t even have this boundary in place—we’ve heard about or know people who stay in abusive relationships for whatever reason. These people are missing the basic boundary, You can’t hit me. Okay, let’s assume you have this boundary in place and people don’t hit you. Do people yell at you? Well, that is only one level out from hitting—not a whole lot of protection. You need to expand your boundary from, People can’t hit me, to, People can’t yell at me. Not even your boss and certainly not your lover or spouse.

Susan, a sales assistant at a retail shop, was having a tough time with an extremely demanding boss who thought nothing of blowing off steam by ranting and raving at her subordinates. She would yell at Susan for making even the smallest error. Susan also allowed her colleagues to tease her about her Midwestern expressions and accent. All of this is a simple case of missing boundaries. Once Susan decided it was no longer acceptable for people to yell at her, make her the butt of a joke, or take advantage of her, everything began to turn around. Her colleagues stopped teasing her, and things really seemed to be turning around. She got a big promotion at work to sales executive because now her boss, her colleagues, and even her clients had more respect for her. How did she do this? She simply informed them, using the four-step communication model in Tip 6.

Boundaries work equally well at home. A client’s boyfriend had a hot temper, and he would get angry on occasion and yell at