small business success tips<\/a> of my earliest work mentors who, whenever she caught her team complaining, criticising, or condemning, ordered us to drop these 3 C’s and replace them with one of the 3 A’s of Appreciation, Acceptance, and Acknowledgement.<\/p>\nHer mantra has stuck with me for the best part of a working life but I’ve always thought that the most important of her small business success tips was Appreciation. I’ve often needed to use it when working with people who I didn’t always hit it off with and who might have otherwise made me complain, criticise or condemn. Instead I have always tried to see the best in them, what I call “the jewels in their crown”. And that has always worked for me.<\/p>\n
The reason why complaining, criticising, and condemning are such loser reactions is that keep us away from being successful is because they take us to a place where we can play victim. When we play victim, we feel disappointed, we feel self-pity, and we have a ready-made excuse for not getting the best out of others and ourselves.<\/p>\n
Here is a story from Alan Cohen who reminds us that when we allow ourselves to feel like a victim, whether in small business scenarios or in life, we end up playing hurt and playing small when really what we should be doing is playing to the best we can.<\/p>\n
A man is strolling down a street when a flowerpot falls off a windowsill above him and crashes at his feet, narrowly missing his head. The man stops and thinks of how he should react.<\/p>\n
If he has a history of thinking like a Victim, he will probably believe that here we go again: why is it always me? and will go home feeling sorry for himself.<\/p>\n
His second thought might be one of retaliation for the person responsible for the near-calamity and rush up to the apartment from where the pot fell and punch out the owner’s lights.<\/p>\n
His third reaction might be to take a stoic view about the accident and reason that it was his karma for the pot to miss him and simply walk on.<\/p>\n
But our man decides on none of these. He is an appreciator. He goes to the nearest florist, purchases another flower, finds the apartment from which the pot fell, and gives it to the owner to replace the one he lost.<\/p>\n
I guess there’s a thread running from my 3 A’s mentor through seeing the jewels in other peoples’ crowns right up to Alan Cohen’s flowerpot man.<\/p>\n
It’s about learning how easy it is to appreciate the finer things in life but knowing how more important it is to appreciate the rest that we often dismiss as “bad”, “disappointing” or “unpleasant”.<\/p>\n
Life shouldn’t be about the occasional wonderful moments. In order to have success in every aspect of life, it should be about the wonder in every moment.<\/p>\n
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It got me thinking how quickly the world seems to change around us and how easy it is to go from appreciating things one minute to not appreciating them the next.<\/p>\n