Imagine that you are driving in an area that is unfamiliar to you, just hoping the directions you scratched on a napkin will get you to where you need to be, when all of a sudden you see a detour sign ahead. Now this wouldn’t be so bad if it were a “good” detour, meaning that shortly after following the directions of the first detour sign you promptly see yet another detour sign which continues to direct your path, and another, and another until you find yourself on the correct course once again. That is a “good” detour.

Now, imagine once again the same scenario, only this time you experience a “bad” detour. A “bad” detour is simply this: after the first detour sign causes you to leave your original path there are no more detour signs to get you back on the right path. This is a “bad” detour because it only gets you off course, but not back on again.

In this case the “creators” of the detour gave no thought as to directing you back to your original course, only how to get you off course. When it comes to having a plan for your day or your week that is intended to get you to your desired “destination”, YOU are the creator of the detour.

Having a good detour in life boils down to having a good plan for the week written down, with some flexibility built in, so that if you experience a “detour” in the form of an interruption or some sort of emergency you can enter back onto the original path at an appropriate point. On the flip-side, if you have no plan at all then it would be difficult to resume a plan you never had. Having a good plan is like a “good” detour, it can help you get back on track and on your way to a successful week in spite of obstacles life may throw in your way.

To receive a Free Coaching Session to discuss the effectiveness of your planning just click the image below.

To Your Success,

Kip Kint
Success Coach & President
Mission Ignition, Inc.

No, I don’t mean your chronological age, you know, the one that is determined by your birthday. Everyone knows how old they are using that criteria. I mean, do you know how old you really are? Are you biologically younger, older, or the same as your calendar age?

The average lifespan for an American is 72 for men and 78 for women. Based on various factors that have a direct or indirect impact on longevity your lifespan may be either longer or shorter than these averages. So, how old you really are is based on how much longer or shorter you might expect to live in comparison with the average.

For example, I am 42 years old, according to my birthday. However, my “Real Age” is 29 years old according RealAge.com, a popular health website that assesses your real age according to your lifestyle, diet, execercise, genetics and many other health-related factors. Find out your real age today by taking the free assessment at RealAge.com. You will even get a customized action-plan for lowering your real age in as little as 90 days. Just click the image below and find out what your Real Age is.

If you would like to have a free coaching session to discuss your health goals or any other goals you may have just click the link below to submit your request.

To Your Success,

Kip Kint
Success Coach & President
Mission Ignition, Inc.

The other day I was tidying up in the kitchen when I heard all heck break loose downstairs. Apparently there was some sort of exchange between by 14 year old daughter and my 8 year old son. My boy came out on the short end of the stick, suffering some minor lacerations to his knee. Although it seemed clear that it was an accident the first thing my son said to me when I arrived on the scene was, “She did it on purpose.” This statement gave me pause to think about how we use the phrase, “on purpose“.

Was it really my daughter’s “purpose” to injure her brother? I don’t think so, nor is that what he meant when he said it. Usually when we say, “on purpose” what we really mean is “intentionally”. However, intention and purpose are two very different things. We might occasionally do things intentionally that have nothing to do with our purpose. But to have a purpose, a clear and meaningful one, and to be on that purpose, now that is something that can have a meaningful and lasting impact in our lives and the lives of others.

As this New Year unfolds let me encourage you to have a purpose, know that purpose inside and out, and focus your energy and efforts toward being truly “on purpose.” Being on purpose is like being on target, and that is one target you definitely don’t want to miss.

If you would like to learn more about your purpose and how to be on purpose in your life let me encourage you to sign up for a free coaching session by clicking the link below.

To Your Success!

Kip Kint
Success Coach
Mission Ignition, Inc.

Want to build a better relationship? Whether it’s your marriage, a partnership, or a relationship with a child, you might enjoy performing this little experiment. It’s called the 7 Day Relationship Experiment. Here’s how it goes:

For seven days – without letting the other person know what you are doing – flood the relationship with positives.

Withhold:

• Criticism
• Put-downs
• Complaints
• Interruptions
• Corrections
• Directions

Go out of your way to:

• Express genuine appreciation (pretended or exaggerated praise is deadly to this exercise and to the relationship).

• Create the opportunity to give a kind and friendly touch to the other person in a non-demanding and unobtrusive way at least once each time you are together. This could be as simple as a pat on the back, a hand on the arm, or an arm around the shoulder.

• Choose at least three things the other person would really appreciate this week … and DO THEM!

Note the changes, if any, in the other person’s behavior over the course of the seven days. Write down your conclusions from the experiment.

So, are you feeling adventurous? Are you ready to try the experiment? You never know what might happen!

Want a Free Coaching Session to discuss an important relationship you would like to improve? Click the link below:

To Your Success!

Kip Kint
Success Coach & President
Mission Ignition, Inc.

I was talking to a prospective coaching client the other day. As I was explaining the emphasis we place on balance and personal success in our coaching programs he interjected and made an interesting comment. He said to me, “Kip, I know I have some things I need to improve on personally, but for right now I really need to just focus on improving my business.”

What a revelation! In one sentence he revealed a paradigm that more than anything else was holding him back from being as successful as he could be. There is one principle, one natural law, one fundamental truth that he was not recognizing and applying, and that is this:

No Success, including Business Success, can precede Personal Success.

You see this is the deal, the crux of it all really. The fastest car in the world doesn’t win the race without a highly skilled driver; the finest paint and brushes have no meaningful impact on the canvas without the hand of a talented artist; and successful, highly effective businesses are run by people who are successful and highly effective as human beings. It is a PRErequisite. Being an effective, successful person does not come after first building a successful business or career. IT COMES FIRST!!! If Business Success is the chicken, and Personal Success is the egg, then the answer to the age-old question is most definitely and emphatically “The Egg!”, and if you will take the time to nurture the egg (your personal effectiveness) you will find it results in a more robust and healthy chicken (in other words, a great business/career).

Deep down you know this is true, we all do. Yet so many would try to convince themselves they can take the shortcut that no one else has been able to take, that somehow they can have the business success they desire without doing the work on themselves first. Why do so many try it? Why do they skip the part where they work on themselves and work on other things first? The answer is fear.

Think of it this way, if I try my hand at creating a successful business and fail I can reason that it was due to any number of reasons and circumstances outside my control. However, if I work on being an effective person and fail… well, you can see how this pill might prove a little harder to swallow if we let such fears get the best of us. As a result, most of us focus our efforts in either the wrong place, or in the right place but prematurely (in other words, without working on personal effectiveness first).

My Challenge to You:

1. Focus your efforts on becoming a highly effective person, one who makes and keeps commitments to yourself and has a high degree of personal integrity and follow through, even when no one else knows of your commitment.

2. Be an excellent manager of your time. It’s not about scheduling every minute of your time, but rather doing the right thing at the right time.

3. Establish habits that will serve you throughout the rest of your life, habits that will lead you to succeed regardless of your chosen business or career endeavors.

If you will do these things I am confident you will enjoy tremendous success in all aspects of your life, including business and career.

To get a Free Coaching Session to discuss your Business and Personal Success and Effectiveness just click the link below:

To Your Success!

Kip Kint
Success Coach & President
Mission Ignition, Inc.

There are plenty of planning methods out there. There are a lot of different ways to organize your schedule. Which one is best? Well, of course the answer can be highly subjective. However, based on my experience in coaching thousands of clients, to be more effective in getting the results they want out of business and life I have found a method that works best for most. It is Roles-based Planning and it can make all the difference in the success you achieve in the significant roles in your life. Here’s how it works:

1st:
Clearly define your vision for each of your significant roles in your life. Are you a Business Leader, a Husband, a Mother, a Friend? What is your vision for fulfilling those roles in your life? The more clear and well-articulated the vision the greater the likelihood you will achieve it.

2nd:
Plan goals for each role each week. These are not necessarily big, long-term goals, but rather goals that can be fulfilled and accomplished within the coming week. List these goals right under your roles. The most common way to do this is called a Weekly Compass (right).

3rd:
Time-activate your goals into your schedule. I suggest you color-coordinate them with a different color for each role. I use blue for my role as a Business Leader and pink for my role as a Husband, purple for my role as a Father and yellow for my role as a Coach. The colors you choose are up to you. Of course this will add a few minutes to the planning process. However, the increased effectiveness in the execution of your plan will make it more than worth it. Here is a sample calendar that has been color-coordinated to match the Weekly Compass and Roles it is associated with (click calendar to enlarge):

This life, and the success we enjoy in it, is all tied to relationships, and every relationship we have is tied to a role the we play in that relationship. The more successful you are in your roles, the more successful you are in life.

To your Success!

Kip Kint
Success Coach & President
Mission Ignition, Inc.

One of the important “spokes” on the Wheel of Life, that I have blogged about in the past, is Fun & Recreation. In working with over 3,000 clients I have found that when time gets tight this is one of the first things to be sacrificed by most people. I have come to the conclusion that this is not the wisest path to take.

Fun & Recreation are important, even critical, to one’s self-renewal. Even break down the word “recreation” and what do you have? Re-Creation! We need to constantly re-create and renew ourselves. Human Beings are so-wired that we need to have fun and laugh and smile. In fact, we are hard-wired for this. It is a proven fact that just smiling, even when you don’t feel like doing so, will release a very small amount of endorphins in the brain, the very chemical that causes us to feel good. Keep smiling long enough, and eventually you really do feel like smiling. Add laughter to that equation and look out, you’re feeling pretty great before you know it. Engage in activities you personally find to be fun and recreational and you are getting some much-needed renewal.

One of the exercises I assign to my Coaching Clients is called, “20 Things I Love To Do”. Basically, it’s like this:

Take out a piece of paper, or turn on you computer and begin brainstorming things that you love to do. Never mind how long it’s been since you last did it. Maybe it was yesterday for some, or 20 years ago for others. The point is that it’s a brainstorm, so no “editing” while you’re writing. Come up with at least 20 things and put them on your list.

Next, ask the following questions for each of the items you brainstormed:

1. How long since I last did this?
2. Do I prefer to do it alone, or with someone?
3. Is it Job Related?
4. Is it generally done spontaneously, or does it require some planning?
5. Is it more fast-paced, or slow-paced?
6. Is it Mental, Physical, Social, or Spiritual (or any combination of the four)?
7. Does it cost money, or is it free?

The answers to these questions are merely to shed a little insight into the things you love to do, and help you choose what you might do next, and then do it.

So, don’t delay. Having Fun and Re-Creating are critical to your success and happiness. I suggest you start right away.

If you would like to see what your Balance Score is for Fun & Recreation in your life, just click the link below to take a Free Personal Assessment of your balance.

To Your Success!

Kip Kint
Success Coach & President
Mission Ignition, Inc.

You CAN…

You CAN…

You CAN…

…and coaching is a CAN OPENER!

I have often talked about how most people do not lack in ability. You CAN do almost anything you desire. Your ability is not holding you back. For most people the issue is a lack of accountability, usually to themselves. Coaching addresses this issue head on. In coaching you make commitments that will move you toward your goals and dreams, and then you are held accountable by your coach for keeping those commitments, week after week.

Your dreams are achieved by making and keeping a series of commitments that will ultimately result in the realization of the dream. It starts, of course, with making the right commitments, but more importantly you must keep the commitments in order to achieve the desired results.

If you are making and keeping the right commitments on your own then you should be congratulated. You have either already achieved your goals and dreams, or are in the process and happy with your progress and your success.

If you are not making and keeping the right commitments then you may be experiencing the frustration that accompanies a lack of success, or progress that is too slow for your liking. Either way, having an accountability and success partner in the form of a coach may be just the thing for you. I encourage you to take the online FREE Balance and Success Assessment to see where you stand.

As I said before, you CAN, and coaching is a CAN OPENER. So, if it’s a good fit then let’s get together and we’ll take your tentative “I CAN’s” and turn them into confident “I WILL’s” and ultimately celebratory “I DID’s”.

Click on the video below to see one of the most amazing examples of I CAN that I have ever seen.

To your Success!

Kip Kint
Success Coach & President
Mission Ignition, Inc.

Imagine that you have just made your final payment on your home mortgage after 30 years of paying it faithfully every month. Imagine that the original purchase price of your home was $200,000.00 and now that you have paid your home off, with interest, you have paid $480,000.00, or in other words you have paid 280,000.00 in interest alone. I want you to further imagine that you then receive a letter from your mortgage company which reads something like this:

Dear Faithful-Mortgage-Payer,

The purpose of this letter is to thank you for paying your mortgage in full. In particular we would like to thank you for paying 280,000.00 in interest, which you are no doubt aware was completely OPTIONAL according to the fine print of your original mortgage contract. We here at Big Bucks Home Loans are indeed grateful for this great sum of EXTRA money and appreciate immensely your willingness to pay us such a substantial sum out of the goodness of your heart.

Sincerely,

Gill T. Money
Customer “Care” Director

How would you feel, if after 30 years of faithfully making your mortgage you received such a letter? How would you feel if you pulled out your original mortgage contract and, sure enough, you locate the fine print that states that your payment of interest was completely optional? Everyone loves to earn interest, but no one likes to pay it. Anyone would be mortified to find out they had paid a substantial sum of interest when it wasn’t necessary.

Now, of course there is no such mortgage, but I wanted to plant clearly in your heart and mind what it would feel like to pay so much interest unnecessarily. With that said, I will share with you one of my favorite quotes that I heard from a wonderful lady by the name of Belva Ashton years ago in England:

Worry is the interest you pay on trouble before it ever comes.

Think about it. When you worry you experience all the emotions and stress related to a future negative event as if that event has already occured. If the event never occurs, then in effect you have paid “interest” unnecessarily. On the other hand, if the event does in fact occur then having paid the interest in advance (worrying) did you no good, as you experience all the same emotions and stress again at the time of the event, in effect paying double the “interest”.

My advice to you is to simply take care of those things you have influence over and leave the worry out of it. That is the essence of true Proactivity.

To Your Success!

Kip Kint
Success Coach & President
Mission Ignition, Inc.

When it comes to success in any part of our life you can absolutely be a 10! I know there are those who say that a 10 symbolizes perfection and don’t believe that a 10 is possible. I would suggest that a 10 in success is defined by you, and is therefore completely attainable. You decide what a 10 in success is for you in each significant area of your life, and then set your goals to get there. Break your goals down into Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Timed actions (a.k.a SMART) and then take those actions until you achieve success with that goal.

Example:

Let’s say that in terms of your current performance and success you deem yourself to be a 6 in your career role (self-assessed). You decide that in order to be a 10 in the coming year you need to add 24 new clients and increase your personal income by $20,000.00. This represents your current vision of what a 10 in success is for you in your career role, NOT perfection in that role. When you have achieved success in your goal then you are, at the time, a 10 by your own definition. At that point you should enjoy your 10. Celebrate it. Eventually, when you are ready and you have enjoyed your success for a while, you will look around and see that from your new vantage point there are even higher peaks to be scaled, now far more reachable than before because of your success in reaching your previous 10. At that point you can relabel your 10 as an 8, and set a goal for reaching your newly defined 10.

Author and Motivational Speaker Zig Ziglar once said, “Once you have reached the top, you may find what you thought was the top was in fact only a stepping stone to a place even higher up.”

So, what does a 10 in success look like to you? Clarify your vision, set your goals, and go for it. You can be a 10 in Success!

If you would like to see what it looks like to be a 10 in something check out this amazing video demonstrating incredible balance and success:

[youtube]ISJjxsh7mZ8[/youtube]

To assess your current balance and success take my FREE Personal Assessment.

To your Success!

Kip Kint
Success Coach & President
Mission Ignition, Inc.