For example, one might say that a “President” is at the “top,” and what’s at the “bottom?” It’s often “the janitor.”

But I propose to you that your “inner janitor” may be one of the most important functions in your life.

And I want to encourage you to embrace your inner janitor and hold him up as one of the highest and most important personas, whose functions will enable you to get what you really want.  In fact, without the janitor, it is actually impossible to get what you want.

So let’s consider what the janitor actually does.

The janitor cleans up after you.  He (or she) cleans up the messes, he tidies up the area, he sweeps the floors, and he makes everything nice again.

But more than nice, he makes everything functional.

Think about the kitchen.  If you’re trying to cook a meal and you didn’t clean up as went, you would end up with piles of dishes, pots and pans all over the place, and you’d have no ability to continue cooking.  If this went on for days, you would even run out of pots.  You would be unable to eat because of all the clutter.  At some point, you have to stop cooking and creating new concoctions, and you have to clean up after yourself.

This is a great example of the value of our “inner janitor.”  By cleaning up our messes, he actually enables us to continue doing what we want to do.

But what is a mess, really?

Raymond Aaron, a master coach and mentor, taught me that a mess is anything that is not working for you, anything that is not in alignment with who you truly are.

A mess can be a relationship that isn’t full of love and joy and harmony, a financial situation in which you’re consuming more than you’re producing (and incurring debt), or a poor health condition (like being overweight).

A mess could be having piles of clutter everywhere, or a poor filing system where you can’t find things when you need them.  It may be a faulty premise that isn’t serving you or that keeps you from facing the truth and owning your power.

Anything that is not in alignment with who you truly are is a “mess.”

It’s absolutely critical that you begin to clean up your messes and to get into alignment.  Only then can you keep making progress on your most important goals.

So much of the time, we are focused on achieving great things, but we are often sabotaged or our progress is slow because we haven’t handled those messes in our lives that are holding us back.

That is the function of the janitor.  And it’s why the janitor needs to be held in the highest esteem.

Give him the respect he deserves.  Make time for him to do what he does best.  Cherish what he does for you.  His function is to clean up those messes, bring us back into alignment, and help us live an empowered life!

So embrace your “Inner Janitor!”

Visit www.MakeProgressNow.com to learn more.

This may be a shocking question to you.  But if you haven’t made the decision to change, to do whatever is necessary to get what you want, it’s because you simply don’t have enough pain in your life.

It’s a fact that human beings will do more to get out of pain than they will to experience pleasure.  (For some people not having enough pleasure or not getting a goal is painful.  It all depends on your perspective and where you position yourself in your life.)

The question is “do you have enough pain to change?”

When I was a professional massage therapist, I used to notice that my clients would often suffer with mild levels of discomfort or even great levels of discomfort, but until they got “enough pain,” they weren’t motivated to come in and address it.

We are often taught to “tough it out” and that having a high “pain threshold” is a good thing.

So I would teach them to become more sensitive to their bodies, and to try and lower their pain threshold. In this way, they could begin to hear their bodies messages sooner and it didn’t have to get so bad before they would take action and make the change.

We often learn to live with whatever level of discomfort or pain that we have in our lives. It becomes “normal” for us.  We often don’t notice that anything’s wrong if it is “normal.”  What gets our attention is a “change” from normal.

The problem is when our normal is not serving us.  When our normal is not aligned with our true purpose, our passion, our joy.  And we become used to it.

So I would suggest to my clients that they consider raising their standards and make “feeling good” their “normal.”  Then they’ll be more likely to notice when they’re feeling “not so good,” and can make adjustments quickly, before it has to get so bad that they have to stop everything in order to address it.

“If you’ve got negative emotion and you don’t know what it means and you don’t release it, don’t worry, it will get bigger. And if you still don’t recognize it, so by Law of Attraction, you continue to hold it to you, don’t worry, it will get bigger…”  – Abraham-Hicks

So the question is, “what level is enough pain for you?

When is enough, enough?

When will you hit that point, where you say “No More!”  “Never Again!”  “No way.  I’m not standing for this!  This is not okay and I’m not going to take it any more!”?

That’s the point when you claim your power, when you’ll do whatever is necessary to get that change in your life. That’s when you’ll reach out for help.  That’s when you’ll seek out and find new guidance and new wisdom, a new perspective.  That’s when you’ll make the change.

My psychotherapist colleagues and friends in AA talk about “hitting bottom,” that point at which you say “no more, never again, I can’t live like this any more.”  It’s the point at which they decide they’ve “had enough” and they begin to make the change.

It’s a new level of consciousness.  They’ve finally let go of their position, changed their beliefs, and made the decision that they’re no longer willing to cope, to settle, or get by with the status quo.

Another friend of mine talks about being in bed at night and being really cold, but not getting out of bed to get an extra blanket because he’s cold – but not cold “enough.”  And then, at a certain point, he gets tired of suffering, and the pain of being cold outweighs the pain of getting up to fix it.

So my question for you is:  What is it going to take for you to be in “enough pain?”

When will you decide to no longer accept the status quo and to make a change?

When will you begin creating a life that is dramatically better?

The good news is that you can choose to raise your standards and create a new “normal.”  You can lower your pain threshold, the point at which you’re no longer willing to suffer with discomfort.

Because the lower your pain threshold is, the sooner you experience “enough pain,” the better your life can become.

The value of having a coach on your side, no matter what goals you are working with, is to help you set the right target and manage your pain levels so that you will stay motivated.  And by install new habits that will keep you on track, and prevent you from sliding. you can create a new, self-sustaining “way of being.”

Let me help you raise your level of consciousness, to make new decisions and to raise your standards so that you no longer settle for “life as it is,” for a “normal” that isn’t really working, and reach instead for “life as it can be.”

Visit www.MakeProgressNow.com Check out one of our coaching programs, come to a workshop, and sign up for my newsletter.

Enjoy the life of your dreams.

A famous quote by Albert Einstein goes something like this:

‘You cannot solve a problem with the same level of consciousness that created it.’

This insight is extremely valuable because it calls upon us to raise our level of consciousness in order to solve our problems. It also points out that if you created a problem (or haven’t created a way out), you are probably not going to be able to solve it.

Unless of course, you get help.

Unless you expand your knowledge, gain a broader perspective, adjust your level of thinking, etc.

So what does that have to do with Home Depot?

As I discuss in my income and goal setting workshops, Americans are suffering from an inflammation of the “do it yourself” gland.

I call it “Home Depot-itis” because Home Depot’s slogan is to “do it yourself” and it is one of the biggest mistakes that most people make.

It is what keeps them playing small. It is what keeps them trapped.

And it is why 80% are not as successful or happy as they would like to be and less than 95% are wealthy by the time they are 65 years of age, even after working hard for 45 years of their lives.

Doing it yourself means that you aren’t going to benefit from people who know how to do it better than you. It means you are going to have to take time away from doing other things. And it means that you’ll always be stuck doing it yourself because you won’t be taking the time to increase your resources because you’re too busy doing it all yourself.

Several of my mentors talk about what a horrible philosophy this is and how millions of people are unknowingly sabotaging themselves because they think they have to do it all themselves.

But what if you WEREN’T ALLOWED to do it yourself?

What if you HAD to get it done, but you also had to find a way to get it done WITHOUT doing it yourself?

All of a sudden, a whole world of possibilities open up. You begin to brainstorm possibilities, discover resources, and make connections that enable you to get it done without doing it yourself.

No matter what the area in question is, it is highly likely that there are other people in the world who have more knowledge, skill and expertise on that subject than you do.

So why not use them? Why not learn from them? Why not expand your capabilities by enrolling them as a member of your support team to help you?

Wouldn’t that give you more freedom? Wouldn’t you have more time to be able to do what you love doing? What you’re really good at? Couldn’t you make a lot more money if you stopped doing it all yourself and focused on those things that had a higher payoff?

J. Paul Getty once said “I would rather have 1% of the efforts of 100 men, than to have 100% of my own efforts.”

He really understood this principle of leverage and of not doing it all yourself. No wonder he was so successful.  (He was the richest man in the world when he died.)

This is a great example of what “raising your level of consciousness” means.

And it is an important example of why you need a coach.

A coach can help you raise your level of thinking.

A coach can ask the tough questions that might be simple or obvious to an outsider, but that you are totally blind to because you are in the middle of it… especially if you are trying to do it all yourself.

All incredibly successful people use coaches. And the most successful have multiple coaches to help them in many different areas.

Everyone needs a coach or a mentor or a counselor or a mastermind group.  So make sure you get the support you need.  Make sure you build the resources around you that you need to challenge your thinking and to grow your level of consciousness.  Like they say “think out of the box.”

THE BOTTOM LINE?

Take the advice of Albert Einstein:  Change the level of your thinking…

Stop trying to do it all by yourself.

Visit http://www.MakeProgressNow.com and let me help you reach your goals faster, smarter, and easier than you ever thought possible. Or if you aren’t clear about what you want, let me help you find your direction and pick the right goals for the right time for the right reasons.

And while you’re there, see if you qualify for a free coaching session.

Because life is too short to have to figure it out all by yourself.