Despite what you might hear on the nightly news or blasting from your car radio on your commute, integrity matters. A lot. As a sales and service professional, there will be times in your business where you will be tested and tempted. Staying strong in your integrity is a daily practice and commitment. Let’s look at three strategies that can help you stay on track.
- Stop doing what you don’t want anybody to know about. How does that saying go? “Everybody’s got dirty little secrets?” Consider this: There are two things you can’t hide from: yourself and the universe. (The definition of the universe will vary from person to person. If you’re spiritual, it could be a deity or some form of higher consciousness; if you’re more secular, it refers to anything external that might support you in getting to your Next Level.)
If you tell the universe that you’re doing one thing, but behind closed doors, you’re doing another, then you are not living by your word. So, when you set goals or commit yourself to achieving a Next Level, the universe will not support you because the universe “sees” you as someone who doesn’t keep his word. I know you probably hate me right now, but, hey, I didn’t write this rule, the universe did.
- Clean up past relationships. One dictionary definition for integrity is “The quality or state of being complete or undivided: completeness.” When you have something unsaid that sits in the corner of your mind, this is an incomplete item. If you avoid a person or a task, that item, by definition, is incomplete. So, you might have somebody in your life whom you have stopped talking to because you had an argument or disagreement. Usually, when this happens, we hold onto the anger, judgments and negative thoughts about that person. Why else would we still not be talking to him? These emotions, thoughts and feelings create more baggage that weighs us down and steals our joy. It’s time for you to consider mending some fences.
Now, I’m not saying that you should call every Tom, Dick and Jane to kiss and make up. I do believe that there are some toxic relationships in the world, and you may be better off not being around those people. You have to ask yourself whether the person whom you stopped talking to was the problem, or whether you were the negative influence on the relationship at the time.
Although it may be difficult to answer, only you know the truth about that question. If you were being toxic, it might be a good idea for you to reach out to that person and attempt to get rid of the baggage, let go of the judgments and try to rebuild your relationship. Not for their benefit, but for yours. Here’s a little side note: Usually the things that are hardest for us to do are where the biggest growth occurs. Cleaning up a relationship will free you to be more productive and happier.
- Get your home in order. Make a list of all the things in your house that are draining your energy and do something about them. For example, you might have a drawer in your house that has all these lonely keys in it, and you don’t know which locks they belong to. Somehow, you think that the locks and keys are going to miraculously hook up with each other all by themselves. What do you say to yourself every time you pass that drawer? I bet you say something like this: “I’ve got to clean out that drawer someday.” Well, guess what? Every time you walk past that drawer with that thought, the drawer is sucking energy out of you. Not much, just a little bit, but it’s still an integrity issue. It’s something that you’ve left incomplete and have avoided. Or you have that pile of things that needs to be dealt with in the home. Or there’s that doorknob that you keep meaning to fix. Or there are those clothes: either you’re hoping that they will come back into style or you’re hoping that you’ll lose 20 pounds in your sleep so that they will fit the next morning.
All these things are just little integrity issues. They drain your energy. So, make that list and schedule half a day each week to get to those items. Now, as you work on that, new things may show up that need to be added to that list. As a matter of fact, this list may never be completed, but at least you’re living from integrity by doing something about it rather than internally complaining about it or avoiding it entirely.
When you live in your truth and integrity, you have less stress, less worry—and more reasons to smile. And you know me and that smile thing—it’s so worth the effort. So, what do you say? Are you ready to complete some things and live a happier life? I’d love to hear your thoughts.
Darryl Davis, bestselling author of “How to Become a Power Agent in Real Estate” and owner of Darryl Davis Seminars, has trained and coached over 100,000 real estate professionals around the globe for more than 27 years. He is the founder of the Next Level® real estate training system, The Power Program®, which has helped agents double their production over their previous year. For more information, and the new agent tools that can help take you to your Next Level®, please contact darryl@darrylspeaks.com or visit www.ThePowerProgram.com/NewAgentSuccess
