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“You must take personal responsibility. You cannot change the circumstances, the seasons, or the wind, but you can change yourself. That is something you have charge of.” - Jim Rohn

No matter what your political affiliation or who you support for next president or where you stand on social issues or whether you believe in global warming or not, there’s one thing that everyone seems to be agreeing on these days and it’s this: there’s a recession going on and it seems to be affecting everyone.

We know for sure that gas is expensive, and on the rise, hitting an average of $4 a gallon probably before summer. We see that the real estate market is suffering, especially in places like Florida where the prices were, in recent times, incredibly inflated and are now incredibly deflated. We see the U.S. dollar isn’t worth what it used to be and that people from around the world are seeing this and using this to their advantage as far as buying American properties and businesses for much less than what they once were.

So do we sit around and lament the past. “When I was young, you could buy loaf of bread for three dollars. . .” Do we commiserate about how good things used to be? Well, I suggest that these meditations on the good old days, is counterproductive and probably drawing more fear and negativity when what we really need is to not get stuck in these bad thought loops.

I was talking to a student of mine recently on one of our one-on-one calls. She’s a financial adviser and has a piece of property she is selling in Florida through another student of mine who is a real estate agent. Things are not progressing at all and the house has been looked at by one person who never got back to them.

I’ve recently gone though this process myself so I know how frustrating it is. As persuaders, however, we must realize that we aren’t helping ourselves or our families, or our business associates or our clients, by giving into defeatism and negativity.

Instead, as persuaders, we must be riding the crest of the wave, so to speak, and not flounder behind it. Even in tough times there is money to be made and it is our good fortune that we have been honing our sales skills and our persuasion know-how to ride the wave.

This means that we go the extra mile, we go above and beyond what we were previously doing while maintaining a positive mental attitude.

Times like these are perfect opportunities to work our “self magic” — going over our universes, for example, and reinforcing our intention on all fronts, working more intimately with our gentle giants/other than conscious minds to resolve to have success no matter what the outside world has to say about it, no matter what the things beyond our control (if there is such a thing) have in store. Get to work on that self persuasion and align yourself in such a way that you are impervious to the weather outside.

Last 5 posts by Kenrick Cleveland

• Future Hope - July 7th, 2008
• Let's Get Emotional - June 5th, 2008
• The Core Exposed - June 5th, 2008
• Persuading from The Zone - June 3rd, 2008
• Misery Loves to Spend - April 29th, 2008

Tags: Business