It’s no secret that clarity is one of the keys to entrepreneurial success. This post is a continuation of my series “The 7 Cs of entrepreneurial success.”
Clarity is the ultimate power, and if you want results you’ve never had you need to get 100 percent clear on what you want. ~ Peter Voogd
It’s not enough to say you want to be an entrepreneur; you must have clarity for your vision. The clearer you are about who you are, the type of business you want, the service or product you want to offer, and the customers you want to serve, the easier it will be for you to strategize and act to live your dream.
Why is clarity important?
Entrepreneurs without clarity for their business risk spending years business hopping, marketing to the wrong customers and offering the wrong products or services. Entrepreneurs with clarity for their purpose start businesses that grow and thrive.
How to gain clarity as an entrepreneur.
Who are you?
Do you know who you are at your core? Some of us live our lives and start businesses based on another person’s definition of who we are.
1. To get clarity for your entrepreneurial vision, start by defining your core values.
Your core values are the GPS of your life. They tell you what is really, critical to you. If your vision isn’t a reflection of your core values and your entrepreneurial goals aren’t aligned with your core values, you’ll not be satisfied.
Core values aren’t frivolous. You shouldn’t forego your core values for instant gratification or short-term achievements. For long-term happiness and success your decisions and choices (personal and professional) should be anchored to your core values.
For example –
If one of your core values is having children and being a parent that’s involved in their daily lives, and your partner expects this from you, then starting a business that involves extensive traveling isn’t in alignment with your core value. Your relationship will suffer. Your integrity will be questioned because your action doesn’t match your words.
Another Example –
If one of your core values is honesty/integrity and you overlook your partner, or associate lying about your product or service to procure a sale, by association, you aren’t being authentic. It will wreak havoc on your emotional state.
Your core values represent you but they aren’t you. They influence how you behave, act and think. They fuel your belief system and tell the world what to expect from you.
Your core values were learned at an early age from the people in your inner circle. (Parents, other family members, teachers, culture, religion, etc.) And your personal values are lessons learned from life experiences. Your core values are part of your subconscious reality. More often than not, they’re unconscious responses. This is why it can be a challenge to let them go, even if they prevent you from living the life you choose to live.
Some core values should be replaced and others you should keep forever. The decision is yours to make. For long term success and happiness, your life and your business should be built on the foundation of your core values.
Otherwise –
Your foundation will be shaky.
You’ll fall apart when you encounter challenges, dark days, and other hurdles.
You’ll lose credibility and authenticity.
You’ll flounder when you have to make decisions and choices.
You’ll find it difficult to differentiate between right and wrong.
You’ll feel like something is missing even if you build a thriving business.
Are your core values guiding your entrepreneurial vision?
Change begins with awareness. You’ve got to become aware of the core values that are guiding your life (unconsciously and consciously).
Ponder this – What are your core values for these areas?
family and friends
business
relationship
environment
lifestyle choices
money
health
fun /recreation/leisure
personal growth/learning
Write them down.
Reflect –
Are other people’s core values guiding your life and business?
Decision –
Do you want to eliminate, replace or embrace one or more of them?
Choosing the core values YOU want to guide your life, and making them part of your subconscious reality, will help you to make effective decisions and empowering choices. No more second guessing yourself. You’ll live your entrepreneurial vision with authenticity and integrity.
Having difficulty identifying your core values?
Identifying your core values can be challenging. But the reward is priceless. You’ll build a rock solid foundation for your success.
Visit the pages below and follow the instructions to discover and explore your core values. Write them down. Have fun! Enjoy the process!
Read How to establish your core values
Read Core Values: An Assessment
2. Use your brilliance to create products and services to help your ideal customer, community or cause.
What is your brilliance?
Your brilliance is the thing (s) you do easily and naturally. Your brilliance is what you do best. Some budding entrepreneurs overlook the opportunity to build a business around their brilliance. They don’t see the value because it’s so easy for them to do this thing that in reality is their brilliance.
Your brilliance is right inside of you just waiting to shine.
I promise that once you accept and embrace your brilliance it will blow your mind.
Brilliance is believing in yourself.
Brilliance is being yourself.
Brilliance is fighting for what matters.
Brilliance is keeping a smile on your face.
And brilliance is putting a smile on someone’s face.
Find your brilliance and run like hell with it.
Let your light shine and then inspire someone else to unleash their brilliance.
I promise that life and the world around you will never be the same
~ Wyn Wiley TEDxYouth
Finding your brilliance
It can be difficult to identify what you do well because it’s right under your nose. This simple exercise will give you clarity for what you do best. (your BRILLIANCE)
Write the answers to these questions –
What do the people who know you best (family and friends) say you’re good at?
What do other people say you’re good at?
What comes naturally and easily to you?
What skills, talents, or qualities do you see in others that you know you have?
What do you do that causes you to lose track of time?
What do you do that others find tedious that energies you?
Read How to make money online using your brilliance
Read Why is knowing your WHY important
Finding your ideal customer –
What is your ideal customer’s age, income, and geographic location? What is your ideal customer’s situation presently? How will they benefit from your product or service? To be successful as an entrepreneur you must market to your ideal customer.
Brian Tracy wrote a must-read article at entrepreneur.com that gives you specific steps to determine your ideal customer. Read about it here.
Finding your cause or community to serve –
Answer these two questions and your cause or community will be revealed.
What makes you so angry that if you had the time and financial resources you would be an advocate for and devote your life to make a change?
What would you be doing with your life if money wasn’t an issue?
Don’t wait until you have the time or financial resources to start a movement. Use your brilliance to inspire change, and your creative mind will find the people, resources and opportunities you need.
3. Next write a personal mission statement.
Your personal mission statement should clearly state the type of entrepreneur you’re going to be for the customers whose satisfaction will determine your entrepreneurial success.
Your mission statement will help your customers and others understand who you are, what you do, why you’re doing it, and the benefits from using your product or service.
Here’s an example of a mission statement.
Google’s Mission Statement – “Google’s mission is to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful.”
More examples of what Great Brand’s do with Mission statements by Christine B. Whittemore, here
My mission statement – “My mission is to help Female entrepreneurs build their confidence to pursue their entrepreneurial dreams
Ultimately, my passion and purpose is to help entrepreneurs master their mindset for success.
4. Next write a simple introduction (a one-liner) that defines who you are and/or what you do.
Muhammad Ali said it succinctly “I am the greatest.”
Muhammad Ali had a global stage, so it wasn’t necessary for him to say “I am the greatest heavyweight boxer.” We all knew what he meant with that powerful, simple statement.
My simple introduction – “I am the confidence coach and mindset mastery mentor for entrepreneurs.”
5. Use Visualization to go from uncertainty to clarity.
Visualization (also known as mental imagery) is a powerful tool that world-class athletes use to enhance their performances. Research has shown that there is no significant difference in the performance of athletes who practiced mentally and those who actually practiced. And the athletes who did both (practiced mentally and physically) performed spectacularly well.
Positive visualization isn’t just for athletes. Musicians, surgeons, and successful entrepreneurs have used visualization to achieve their goals. I’ve used it successfully to achieve many of my goals and I guide my clients to do the same. It was mental imagery that helped me to complete the Los Angeles Marathon 2009, even though my knee wanted me to quit after 5 miles.
“Whatever the mind can conceive and believe, it can achieve.” ― Napoleon Hill
Your subconscious mind is your success team.
It doesn’t differentiate between what’s real and what’s imagined. What you imagine or visualize elicits the same emotional response and activates the same neural networks as the real life event.
How powerful is that? Think of the limitless possibilities.
You, too, can achieve clarity for your entrepreneurial goals (and any goal) through visualization. Clarity isn’t about knowing everything about a situation before acting. Clarity is knowing exactly what you want and the time frame for achieving it.
How to gain in clarity for your entrepreneurial goals using positive visualization –
Did you know that some people don’t see images when they visualize? (Are you one of them?) I’ve worked with clients who believed they couldn’t visualize. But, when I ask them to remember something they’ve experienced, such as how they got to my office, a light bulb goes off. Through this simple exercise, they realized that visualization isn’t just about seeing images.
Visualization is a multi-sensory experience.
You can visualize through, smelling, hearing, tasting or having a feeling sense.
Try this: if I tell you to visualize walking along a beautiful beach in the tropics, do you see images in your mind? If you don’t see images you’re doing one or more of the following:
- Hearing the sounds of the waves crashing on the rocks and the sea gulls in flight.
- Smelling the ocean life and richness of the tropical waters.
- Feeling the warmth of the sand between your toes and the kiss of the sun on your skin.
- Tasting the salty water as you take a swim.
Now the exercise. (Read through the instructions several times before you start the exercise)
a. You are the director, producer and star of this vision. It’s up to you (through visualization)to bring all the resources, people, and events together that show YOU are an entrepreneur with clarity for your vision. Clarity for your goals.
Set your imagination FREE.
b. Decide if you’re going to experience this visualization as an observer sitting in the audience watching you, or an active participant observing yourself from within your own body. You can alternate between the two perspectives and see which one feels more comfortable to you.
c. It’s important to use all of your senses (or as many of them as you can) as you do the exercise. What are you seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting and touching. The more senses you use, the stronger the impact on your subconscious mind. Your visualization will be more powerful and it will increase the odds of you making it a reality. What do you hear as you walk along the courtyard to meet an investor or client? How does it feel to touch that check you received as payment for your products/services?
d. Your emotions rule. Allow yourself to have a strong emotional connection to your visualization. Are you excited, happy, ecstatic, joyous, amazed, enthusiastic, or something else? You choose how you want to feel and turn it up to 10. The stronger your emotion, the more quickly having clarity will become a habit.
It takes minutes to visualize a lifetime of experience. Be detailed.
What are the ambiance, backdrop, environment, sounds, feelings, and smells? Who are the people you want to be involved in this experience?
For example, what steps do you take to start your business? What is your product or service? Who are the people in your network? What is your mission? How do you introduce yourself to people? What do your clients, business partners and associates look like? How do you dress?
Also, it’s ultra-important to make your visualization real. It’s OK to be nervous, anxious, and afraid, if this is what you’ll experience in real time. Your subconscious will find a way to overcome these hurdles mentally and physically. The little details increase the odds of you having clarity becoming a reality.
After you’ve read through the exercise several times …
Find a quiet place where you can sit down and relax undisturbed (no cell phone) for 30 minutes.
Are you in such a place? Good!
Close your eyes and focus on your breathing. Allow yourself to relax, and do the exercise. When you’re finished, open your eyes and savor the moment. Now grab pen and paper and write down your vision and your goals. This will make them more concrete and keep your clarity alive until you do the exercise again.
Harness the power of visualization to get clear on your entrepreneurial vision and goals. Practice this exercise for 10 to 30 minutes a day until having clarity and focused direction is your natural state of mind.
Master the technique of positive visualization and your success is guaranteed.
It’s a wrap
Internal clutter will block your clarity. This leads to frustration, unfulfilled dreams, pessimism, burnout and financial loss. Clarity paves the way for your success and it’s the perfect conduit for your self-confidence and courage.
What are you waiting for?
Get Clear.
Live your core values.
Use your brilliance to help those who need it most.
Visualize your success.
Stay focused and live your dream.
You’ve got this!
Your Turn
Do you have clarity for your entrepreneurial vision or your life?
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Is lack of clarity keeping you from moving forward? If you answered yes, you’ll benefit from my FREE strategy session. Contact me today. You’ll be glad you did.
