The Two Keys to Lifelong Success and Happiness

Yes, there may be many “keys” to being happy and feeling a sense of success or accomplishment in your career, but the two I am about to share are the two that have helped me the most in building a loyal following of clients and business partnerships.  I hope they are already familiar to you, and that this is just a reminder, but I find that reminding myself over and over about critical ways of thinking, running my business, and living my life is incredibly helpful.

The Two Keys:

1. Relieve everyone else in your life, and whoever has been in your life, of any responsibility for your success…personally, professionally, and financially.

2. Do not expect any opportunities to be opened up to you by others until you’ve created value for others.

Let’s dive into the first one.  This equates to taking 100% ownership in all that you have (or don’t have) in your life.  Nobody else is responsible.  No excuses.  If it’s to be, it’s up to me.  It may sound harsh, but sometimes I say to myself, “It’s all your fault”.
By doing so, I’m not beating myself up.  I’ve re-trained my mind to feel empowered when things are in my control, rather than allowing my future to be controlled by others.

If you don’t have enough referrals coming in each month to achieve your business goals, whose fault is it, the market’s?  Is it the fault of your existing clients and referral partners for not referring you enough?  No way!  Look inside, at yourself.  Ask yourself how much time you’re putting into increasing your capabilities. How unique is your value-creation, and the experience you provide?  How are you separating yourself from others?  Sometimes I find people aren’t even asking for the business!

Are you frustrated you aren’t making more money?  How are you making yourself irreplaceable?  What are you doing to become so incredibly valuable that your company would do nearly anything to keep you?  Are you waiting for your company to pay for things you could have paid for yourself already?  What books are you reading?  How much are you investing in your own growth and improvement?

What happens if you never adhere to this first key to success and happiness?  You will continue to allow yourself to think others are responsible for your success, and that they have control over you and your future, not you.  You will never feel empowered, and driven to improve and make the changes that are necessary for you to get where you want to be.

Let’s move onto number two.  We all know someone or possibly many people, who walk around with a sense of entitlement.  They act like they are owed something by others around them.  As a loan officer, do you ever find yourself frustrated at a Realtor® or other business partner because they aren’t referring you enough business?  I encourage you to turn this frustration around in your own mind first, and focus on how you can create incredible value in the lives of others.  This can be very simple actually if you just spend more time being interested and less time trying so hard to be interesting.

If you feel that your clients should be telling everyone about your incredible services, then are you 100% confident your service is worth telling everyone about?  Are you going above and beyond every single time…and do they know this?

By focusing on creating unique value for your clients, your team, and your business partners, you should trust that they will eagerly tell others.  But too often I find that the client’s version of uniqueness doesn’t match up with what a Loan Officer’s (or Realtor’s or Financial Advisor’s) definition is.

Keep working toward creating a business, and value-creation that would make your clients and partners tell their friends to not just walk, but RUN, from whoever they are working with and call you!

I’m sure you can think of a lot of examples beyond what I’ve shared that tie to these two keys to lifelong happiness and success.  We all define happiness and success in our own way, but however you define it, I bet making these two keys a normal part of your daily practice will enhance both.  They have for me.