The day after Thanksgiving.

Black Friday.

The official start of the holiday shopping season.

Get out of bed in the middle of the night.
Get out to the stores well before sunrise.
Wait for the doors of the store to open.
Rush in with the mass of people gathered.
Fight for the bargains.
Shop ’til you drop.
Come home exhausted.

It’s the Olympics of shopping. And the competition is stiff.

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People invest time and money. Like an entrepreneurial endeavor, the returns are both financial and psychological. You may save money. And you experience a shopper’s high from finding a great deal.

But BIGG goal-getters rise above the crowd. So instead of talking about retailers getting into the black, let’s talk about how you can get into the black, to make more money.

We’ll discuss three ways to spend Black Friday to make next year a BIGG success.

And the best part is…you won’t have to lose sleep or fight the hoards to do any of them.

Spend the day learning

Let the herd spend the day spending their money. Spend your day learning how to make more money.

People in the know tend to have.
People who know not tend not to have.

So go to the library. Do some research online. Read a book.

Browse for ways to improve a specific skill. Check out a new opportunity.

The possibilities are as long as the lines at the checkout. The lines you won’t have to stand in.

Spend the day planning

Instead of chasing deals in the stores, spend your day calculating how to reach BIGG success.

What are your goals for next year? What needs to happen before year end to set yourself up for BIGG success next year?

Start this holiday season figuring out how to make spirits bright next holiday season.

Then sample the eggnog!

Spend the day organizing

Let the crowd place orders. Spend your day creating order.

Get a jump on your year-end organizing. Get your files set up for next year. Get this year’s files ready to put away.

Don’t worry about sorting out the deals from the duds, like the masses. Sort out what you need to keep and what you don’t now. Clear out the clutter instead of creating clutter.

Warning: You may miss a good deal or two.

But you will save yourself time and money. And set yourself up to make more money.

And here’s the bonus: Black Friday only offers one time deals. Spend your day learning or planning or organizing. It will help you get in the black and stay there. Now that’s BIGG success!

How have you made Black Friday a productive day?

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Everybody’s thinking about, talking about, writing about 2011. What your goals are for this year? What are your New Year’s resolutions?

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BIGG success is life on your own terms. There are five elements of BIGG success; one of them is time.

What’s your horizon?
Time has many dimensions. One of them is your horizon.

For many people, the horizon is today. They live in the moment. That’s all well and good. You certainly need to do that sometimes.

However, the people who are already a BIGG success have a longer horizon. They live presently in the future.

Entrepreneuring = a series of projects
As we’ve said, BIGG success is life on your own terms. The “own” in that phrase is very important. You own your life.

You’re more than a manager marketing a brand. You’re not just a CEO who can cash out at any time. You’re the entrepreneur in charge of a very important enterprise – your life.

Any entrepreneurial enterprise can be viewed as a series of projects. You take on projects to get the business launched. You take on projects for customers. You take on projects to build critical infrastructure.

What successful people do
Talk to any really successful person about what they’re working on right now and you’ll probably hear that it is something due late this year or early next. Sure, they’re working today but it’s for a project scheduled to be completed later.

Think about movies … they often take years before we see the finished product. Or even television shows … as we’re watching this season’s Survivor, they’re filming the next season.

If every project in your portfolio is short-term, it’s unlikely you’ll ever reach BIGG success. You must extend your horizon and expand your vision. You must think longer and bigger.

Otherwise, you’ll end up stuck. You’ll never reach the next level of success. 

Sure, you’ll be busy. But, like George Jetson, you’ll be crying: Jane, stop this crazy thing … HELP … Jane!

What projects are in your pipeline?

Shortly thereafter, he was involved in another, less known but no less historic battle – the ambush at Ai.

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The Ambush at Ai

Joshua found himself in a valley near the city of Ai. The king of that city had heard about Joshua – word about the battle of Jericho had spread throughout the land.

Now Joshua was in the king’s neighborhood. And the king saw his chance to wipe out Joshua and all the people with him.

So the king hastily gathered every single one of his warriors together to go after Joshua’s brigade. The king wasn’t going to take any chances. He would destroy all of them.

The gates of the city flew open. The king’s entire army rushed out.

Joshua and his people saw this mighty group approaching. But they were in a valley – with the king’s legion of soldiers in front of them and a large hill behind them.

What should Joshua and his people do? What would you do?

They did what any rational human being would do under those circumstances. They ran like mad!

The king pursued them. Victory was clearly in sight.

How did Joshua – the master blaster who brought down all the walls of Jericho with just trumpets – find himself in this situation?

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He planned it!

That’s right – he took time to plan. Then he clearly communicated his plan to his troops and they quickly took action on it. Here’s how it went really down:

Just like Jericho, Ai had these massive walls all around it. So, under the cover of darkness, Joshua had sent 30,000 of his troops to hide behind the city of Ai. Then he sent another 5,000 to hide beside the city.

Joshua moved the rest of his troops on top of the hill. The king may have seen this group but he just thought they were moving through the area.

He found out differently the next day.

Joshua and his band of fighters had moved down the hill into the valley. The king knew they were coming; he would respond with all his might!

So he quickly gathered all of his warriors together. The gate of the city flew open. The king marched out with his entire army.

Joshua saw the king coming. He fled!

The king pressed on, barking out orders to hurry. Joshua was right where the king wanted him. This was to be the end of Joshua and the king would be famous for taking down the miracle man.

Joshua kept retreating. The hill was approaching. The king knew he had Joshua trapped. It was only a matter of time now.

“Hurry, hurry”, the king shouted to his men.

Suddenly Joshua turned his brigade toward the advancing throng. The king signaled his army to stop.

His mind was racing: “What was Joshua doing? There’s no way his small group can take on my mighty mass of men. This guy must be crazy.”

The king didn’t see what had happened behind him. He and his troops rushed out of the city in hot pursuit of Joshua. After they were out, Joshua’s 5,000 soldiers rushed in. They sent smoke to signal Joshua and the other troops. Ai belonged to them.

Upon seeing the smoke, Joshua turned his people around. The troops who were hiding behind the city rushed out.

So when the king turned around to seek advice from his inner circle of soldiers – to see what they thought Joshua was doing – he saw 30,000 soldiers nearly surrounding him on two sides.

He looked back toward Joshua. He and his throng had the king surrounded on the other two sides. The king and his army were trapped.

The ambush at Ai. The king – who thought he would wipe Joshua out – got wiped out himself. Joshua and his people had conquered another city.

The king was reactive. He didn’t have a plan. He just acted – quickly and in a hurry. He died.

Joshua was proactive. He carefully crafted a plan which he communicated to every one. He implemented it step-by-step. He conquered. He acted quickly, but he wasn’t in a hurry. That led to bigg success!

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(Image in today's post from bible.somd.com)

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It sounds funny to think about it that way, but your bigg dream can turn into a nightmare in both cases – coming up short or succeeding wildly.

Talent in triumph

We’ve recently seen an example of this with Susan Boyle. She walked out onto the stage of "Britain's Got Talent" as a middle-aged Scottish woman who said that she had never been kissed.

She had lived a very simple life, took care of her mother and sang at her local church. She dreamed of having a career in music for 23 years, even putting together a demo with no success.

Then she took a chance and auditioned for the popular TV Show. It was her bigg opportunity and she nailed it. Her life changed from the moment she began to sing "I dreamed a dream."

The whole world loved Susan!

Talent in turmoil

She became an international singing sensation overnight, going from obscurity to sudden celebrity. She couldn’t anonymously walk over to her local church any longer without a swarm of paparazzi tailing her.

No more quiet at home. Her phone rang off the hook. Everyone – from news outlets to fans – wanted to talk with Susan now.

It took a tremendous toll on her emotional state. Although she smiled for the cameras most of the time, she had a couple of incidents that made her appear unstable.

She was overwhelmed and exhausted by being thrust into the spotlight. In a recent interview on Today, Susan said, “[The] impact was like a demolition ball."

Before long, she started skipping scheduled appearances after her run on the show ended. People questioned her health. They wondered if she had what it took to be a star.

Her bigg dream had turned into a nightmare.

Crossing the line

There’s a dividing line when bigg success is at our fingertips. Will we accept it and move over to the new life of which we dreamed? Will we navigate the road less traveled and keep moving on to bigg success?

Or will we be afraid to cross into the unknown? Will we allow self doubt to hold us back? Will we tell ourselves we don't deserve this bigg success?

You have to plan for bigg success so you’re mentally prepared when you reach this point. How do you prepare?

Visualize it.

By picturing it clearly, you’ll be ready for bigg success when you reach it. You’ll also be more likely to get there! Use all your senses to experience it as if it had already happened.

Build a support network.

Surround yourself with people who care about you and believe in you. Associate with people at the level you’re trying to reach. Let them guide you on your way to your bigg dream and reach out a hand once you've made it.

That's what Susan Boyle finally did. As she said on Today, "I've got to be honest here. I guess I had to get my head around it, but through the guidance of a great team — and they are very good — I was able to see that in perspective and really turn that around.”

Bigg goal-getters work hard every day to achieve their bigg dreams. Make sure you also spend some time planning for that moment when you step into the limelight and shine. That's preparing for bigg success!

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Thanks so much for reading our post today. Next time we’ll discuss what a karaoke party has in common with social media. Please join us. Until then, here’s to your bigg success!

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Are You a Victim of Your Own Success?

(Image in today's post by xymonau)

It’s important to look at how you spend your time to determine how to save time. One question to look at is how much time you spend putting out fires.

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Pause and reflect

Certain jobs seem to require more reaction than others. The closer you are to the customer, the more you may respond reactively. If your direct charges are on the front line, you may spend more time reacting.

In those cases, you need to allow for more reactive time as you plan out your day. However, bigg goal-getters try to minimize the amount of time they spend reacting.

So if a large portion of your day is spent responding to situations, pause and reflect. Ask yourself what you can do about it.

It’s possible that nothing can be done about it, but in many cases there is more in your control than you might think. It’s about moving from a reactive mode to a proactive mindset.

That’s the higher order of personal leadership. As a bigg goal-getter, you want more in your tool kit than just problem-solving capabilities. You also want to be a problem dissolver. Here are three ways to do that:

Elimination

The best way to dissolve a problem is to never have it in the first place. Look ahead and try to discover potential problems. If you think it’s likely that you will encounter that problem, dissolve it by eliminating it in advance.

Many future problems can be handled this way. For example, leaders who establish clear expectations for their people eliminate many problems before they ever happen.

Preparation

The next best way to dissolve a problem is to have an answer in mind before you need it. You may have thought about these problems upfront, but it’s more effective to prepare for its eventuality than to eliminate it in advance.

A great example of this is contingency plans. You have a path you’re going down and you’ve determined in advance it’s your best path. However, as new evidence becomes available, you realize that you need to adjust. Planning that adjustment in advance helps you respond quickly if the time comes.

Prevention

Some problems just can’t be anticipated in advance. However, bigg goal-getters dissolve them by solving the problem now and preventing it from reoccurring in the future.

We have a tendency to rush to solve a problem, but oftentimes, with just a little more effort, we can keep it from happening again. Take time to figure out why it happened. Reverse engineer your process to see if you can prevent it in the future.

As the saying goes, “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.” The best time to start prevention is right after you’ve found the cure. You’re motivated then!

Use that motivation to your advantage to shift your thinking away from solving problems to dissolving them. It leads to bigg success!

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Thank you so much for reading our post today. Please join us next time as we discuss an emotion that leaders must control. Until then, here’s to your bigg success!

Subscribe to The Bigg Success Show in iTunes. 

Subscribe to the Bigg Success feed.

Direct link to The Bigg Success Show audio file:
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