TBBVA 086: How To Stay Motivated When You Aren’t Seeing Results

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Referenced Links:

• Upwork

Tweetables:

If we don’t believe it will happen for us, we could block it. #vatip Gotta Tweet!

Keep going. You haven’t done all that you can do. #vatip Gotta Tweet!

We get motivated when we remember how far we’ve already come. #vatip Gotta Tweet!

In Words:

Hello.  Hello.  Welcome to episode number 86 of The Business of Being a Virtual Assistant.  I am Tiffany Parson and today’s topic is how to stay motivated when you aren’t seeing results.

Now, for this episode, I’m going to use the example of someone that is just getting started on Upwork and not seeing the results that you expected to see.  Now, everything I’m going to share with you in today’s episode, it applies to your virtual assistant business, but it can also apply to other areas of your life.

There are five things that I’m going to focus on that will help you stay motivated when you aren’t seeing the clients that you want, or you aren’t getting the money that you want, or whatever it is.  Maybe you aren’t picking up on a particular topic that you’re trying to learn, whatever the case may be.

Five things and I’ll dive into each one.

1. Evaluate
2. Acknowledge
3. Accept
4. Remember
5. Generate Excitement

1) You are not seeing the results that you want to see, so what is it time to do?  It’s time to evaluate what are you doing to get the results? 

This is where you have to be completely honest with yourself.  What are you doing?  So in using our example with Upwork, look at how many proposals did you send out?  That’s the first thing because it can be a numbers game.  If you sent out three, you need to send out more.  Look at what you said.  Look at what you said, how you said it.  Did what you say and how you say it, were those things that you would respond to if you were the client on the other end?  That’s the part in evaluating.  Just with that alone, you may quickly see, oh, yeah, I could have really done more.

2) Acknowledge.  This picks up where the evaluation left off.  Evaluation is just, you know, write out what did you do specifically in detail, numbers, how many, how you feel about what you said.  Now, in the acknowledging portion, you want to acknowledge whether or not you did all you could do.  If I know I’ve only sent three proposals this week and I am expecting to get a new client this week, that alone lets me know I probably just need to do more.  Are these the first proposals that I’ve ever done?  Then, I need to acknowledge, well, these are the first three that I’ve ever done ever in my whole life, so I’m not going to be great at it out of the gate, right.

As you’re acknowledging whether or not you did all you could do, think about your belief.  Did you believe you would get a new client this week?  Did you believe that you would have more income this week?  Did you believe that you would feel strong about the new tool that you learned?  Acknowledge the belief in yourself in getting the result.

 

You see, if we don’t believe that we’ll do it or that it will happen for us, we could block it and it not happen.

 

Sometimes it’s easier to believe for somebody else than to believe for ourselves.  I get that, and when you acknowledge that, you know what, in the back of my mind, in my subconscious, I didn’t expect that I would get it anyway.  Have you ever done that, whether it’s in your virtual assistant business or just something else in life, whether personal or professional?  Where, you know, in your mind you’re like, oh, I didn’t think I’d get it anyway.  So we have to check our belief.  Some people are over confident and they just think that that confidence is going to get them the result that they want.  No.  It’s got to be both belief and the work behind it.

 

3) Accept.  So once you’ve evaluated, you see what you’ve done, once you’ve acknowledged whether or not that was all that you could have done, where you acknowledge where was my belief level in this, accept it.  Accept that.  Accept that that’s okay.  This is what happened.  This is what I did.  Okay, I accept that, and it’s okay because there’s time.  As you’re accepting all these things, you’re probably thinking already about how you can do it better next time.

In the process of thinking how you can do it better next time, guess what’s happening?  You’re getting motivated, because you want to say, hey, wait a minute, yeah, I can get a new client this week.  Yes, yes, yes.  Okay, last week I didn’t do all I could do, but I’m doing it this week.  You get excited and that gets you motivated to want to do more.

4) Remember.  Remember where you were when you started your journey.  When you started your journey on Upwork, you probably knew nothing about it.  You didn’t understand it.  You didn’t get it.  You were curious, but you just didn’t know.  You had no experience with it, and where are you today?  I’m just using Upwork as our example, but it could be anything.  It could be just, you know, selecting services for your virtual assistant business, or getting your prices down.  I don’t know.

Where were you when you started your journey?  Maybe you were sitting at work or sitting at home in your kitchen, planning and were a little fearful of what would happen.  But now, six months down the road, you’ve already got three clients.  You feel really good about it, you’re focused and moving forward, and now you’re looking to get more results.  So remember where you were when you started.

Guess what happens when we remember where we were?  When we remember, gosh, I didn’t know anything about social media, or I didn’t know anything about creating graphics, or I didn’t know anything about helping someone with their website or blog post, and look where you are now.  Now, you talk about it like you’ve always known about it.

When we remember where we were when we started the journey, guess what happens?  We get motivated again.  I’ve done this before.  I can do it again.  You get motivated, excited all over again because you’re remembering how far you’ve come, and it also helps you acknowledge what all you’ve accomplished as a result of going forward on your journey.

5) It’s already happening as you’re going through your evaluations, your acknowledgments, your acceptance, and your remembrance of everything.  Number five is already happening and that is generating excitement.

Every step helps you generate excitement. 

 

Not that you’re trying to get excited, but you can’t help but get excited because you know there’s more to do.  Can’t get frustrated with yourself.  Can’t get upset with yourself or be mad because you didn’t see the results you want or see, or give up because you didn’t see the results you want to see.  Why?  Because you know I haven’t done everything I could possibly do.  Maybe I haven’t even scratched the surface.  Maybe I’ve just gotten halfway.  Keep going.  Keep going.  You haven’t done all that you can do.

The next time you’re not seeing the results that you want to see, guess what you’re going to do?  You’re going to go back to these five things.  You may have it written down.  It may be just stuck in your mind.  You may have put it in your phone.  But you’ll go back to these five things.

You may do it automatically.  Evaluating, okay, what did I do?  Okay, acknowledging it.  Oh, yeah, I’ve got to do more.  I didn’t reach out to enough people, or I didn’t do enough Facebook ads, or I didn’t post enough on social media.  You know, whatever it is because it applies to your VA business as well as to other things that you want to accomplish in life.

Accept.  You’ll accept it.  You’ll be like, oh, yeah, I didn’t, or, hey, I was on vacation a week.  There was no way I could do it, so we start fresh next week.  You accept it.  Remembering, again, where was I went I started the journey?  After you’ve been on the road for so long going forward in your journey because things change, you’ll get new goals, because the higher you go, the higher you’ll want to go.

When you remember, maybe you won’t have to rewind as far back as you did the first time.  Maybe you’ll just rewind back to a year or to six months, wherever it goes, wherever it takes you, and then that excitement just comes.  Yeah, I was nowhere near this in my thinking, in my mindset.  Not just financially or just with clients, but even in our attitude and our mindset about things.

I guarantee you, if you go through this, you start doing this on a regular basis when things aren’t happening the way you expect – and it’ll be automatic and you’ll remember and think about, you know what, six months ago, this would have got me down.  But it doesn’t get me down anymore.  It just gets me more determined.  It gets me more excited.  It gets me more creative in my approach.  Because, hey, maybe you need to change up the approach.

You’ve been doing it the same way for so long and not seeing the results you want to see.  It’s probably time to change up some things.

That’s fun as well because now you get to do something in a different way that you have not done before.  From this point on, whether you’re seeing the results you want or not, either way, we all want more, right?

I hope this has helped you to stay motivated when you aren’t seeing the results that you want to see.

Thanks so much for tuning in. If you like what you heard, stay tuned. We’ll be back. Tell me what’s going on with you. Come on over the Facebook page: facebook.com/tiffanyparsonbiz, or if you prefer a little shorter message, come on over to Twitter: @tiffanydparson.

See you next time!