I love talking about growth. For the entirety of my career, I have been totally obsessed with figuring out how to scale my business at the speed of light. Trust me when I say that I am not the type of guy that can live with just incremental improvement. It doesn’t work for me. The way I see it, if you are going to do something, you better go full-force and 100%. You could say that I am one-pointedly focused on refining, even redefining, our profession’s approach to growth and productivity.
If you are going to find the path to super-charged growth, then you have to first shift your paradigm to expect it, then direct all of your energy and movement toward your goals. In everything you do and in every way you do it, you have to envision what you want to do and the steps you need to take to get there. See it in your mind’s eye. Lean into the future with hope, focus, and drive. Take action and leverage opportunities.
Like an athlete honing his skills to perform at an elite level, you as a business owner, entrepreneur, or successful businessperson have to give it your all to sculpt an undefeated mindset, master your momentum, and expect the magic in everything you do. Subtle but important shifts in your mindset will act as the foundation for all that is to come. It’s easy to find yourself down and out on the low days, but how you respond to the bottom is often a barometer as to how quickly you’ll make it back to the top.
Let’s jump into the concept of the Undefeated Mindset. Human nature is not to be good. Human nature is not to be great. Human nature is to survive. That’s drinking water and eating rice. It’s not in our DNA to necessarily go out and do things that are exceptional. Too many people buy into the myth that they have genetically inherited a certain level of ambition and are stuck at that level for the rest of their lives. I’m here to tell you that that notion is 100% false.
We should all want to thrive and super-thrive. When I walked into the real estate office which hired me in 2009, I was literally determined to be the Number One agent in my marketplace in Atlanta during my first year. That’s a pretty lofty goal. I was thirty-two years old, saying I wanted to be the Number One agent. How is that going to happen? The only way for it to happen was for me to be completely obsessed with making it happen. Everything I did was focused on selling real estate, networking, and letting everyone in Atlanta know that I could sell their home faster and for more money than anyone else. End of story.
When I went to a restaurant, I would sit at the bar, meet everyone, and buy everyone drinks. When I used the valet, I would give him a hundred bucks and a stack of my listing books and tell him, “For the next ten cars which come in here worth over $150,000, make sure my book gets in their passenger seat.” Everything I did was focused on getting myself in front of people who had good real estate to sell.
When you possess the Undefeated Mindset, you wholeheartedly believe that nothing is out of your reach. In other words, anything you want is totally possible if you’re willing to rewire your brain toward success, abundance, and happiness in both your work life and your relationships.
Once you start on this path and begin making significant changes in your life, people are going to look at you funny… They are going to talk about you. They talked about me and are still talking about me. They talk about my obsession with wanting to be the best, my obsession with doubling my business year after year, my obsession with not settling with what I have—my obsession with not slowing down.
Through the years, as I have doubled and tripled my business, I have normalized what might be called this “abnormal” obsession and behavior for myself. I won’t say that I was immune to the voices and criticism at the beginning; I had to make an act of faith in my vision and keep going. In doing so, I have found ways to manufacture super-charged growth.
People said, “God, there goes Bonneau again. That guy’s crazy. He sure does post a lot online. Why is he always marketing? Why doesn’t he just send out regular-sized postcards? Why does he send them out 3 times bigger than they need to be? What is he trying to prove?” Like I said: quiet the voices; replace them with positive statements about yourself, your potential, and your future. Make these affirmations your personal mantras; they will energize and sustain you. Repeat them until you believe them and until they manifest in your life. The voices inside and outside your head dramatically impact your odds for future growth and success. Whether their effect is positive or negative is determined by which ones you listen to. You have the power to filter out anything that doesn’t serve your goals.
Extraordinary success requires you to do extraordinary things. You’ve got to think ten times bigger than everybody else. You’ve got to work ten times harder and market ten times more than your competitors. You’ve got to get up earlier and produce ten times more. This applies to every aspect of your life. It relates to spending time with your spouse, playing in the yard with your kids, and amping up your workout to stay healthy and in shape. It’s an all-encompassing concept.
Once you have that one-pointed, Undefeated Mindset, once you’ve fixed your eyes on your own North Star, you have to put plans in place to make sure your actions are in line with your mindset. Mastering a sense of momentum is the product of understanding your habits and behaviors. This will ensure that you are constantly moving in the right direction. You have to be accountable to yourself.
When you adopt an Undefeated Mindset, the first step is to create momentum, to make sure your passion and skills are in proper alignment. I call this finding your sweet spot! If your passion and skills are not aligned, you will never gain traction or create the type of movement that leads to major success. You need to establish a clear vision and map out a path for bringing your vision to life. In other words, set clear goals and then think backward. Once you’re in your sweet spot—and this is a place where you feel energized and inspired—you can set out a clear path for achieving your vision. You will then be motivated to overcome any obstacles that stand in the way of you achieving your ultimate goal. Then it’s time to lean in and expect really good things to happen.
What are your dreams for tomorrow? Is it a production level? Is it an income level? What is it? That is not necessarily EASY to define – and it doesn’t just happen! You have to make radical changes to do this. As the old saying goes: how you do anything is how you do everything. You have to be obsessed with hitting your goals and doubling your business. This means you have to operate at a different level in every area of your life.