Tougher than it sounds

Straw Flip


Materials: Drinking Straws

Each student is given a straw and puts one end of it in his or her mouth. Without using hands, they must get the other end into their mouth by twisting and turning it.

Debriefing ideas
- Persistance
- Being willing to look a little weird



Funny Faces


Materials: Rubber bands

Each student is given a rubber band and is instructed to put the rubber band around their head, across the tip of their nose. By only making different facial expressions, they must move the rubber band all the way down their necks.

Debriefing ideas

- Persistance

- Being willing to look a little weird

Everyday Improvements

Last night at midnight we officially kicked off 2010. With the coming of each new year thousands of people all over the world set resolutions and create goals for the upcoming year. However, many fall short after only a few months. Most of the time this is because many try to make changes is too big of chunks.

Sticking to your resolutions requires a small act each and everyday. It requires that you take an action each day. The action does not need to be huge, in fact if it is too big it is harder to sum up the motivation to act.

Each week take the time to create a game plan for each day, what are you going to do to move yourself closer?

Making Everyday Improvements will create lasting change.

ID Your Frog

In an earlier blog post we talked about the concept of Eating You Frog. Now, it is time to explore the first step in that process.

In order to Eat Your Frog each morning it is critical that we ID our frogs, afterall you sure don't want to eat someone elses frog (who knows where that has been).

This step actually begins the night before because by identifying our big task then it allows us to get right to work the next morning. Don't go check Facebook or email just get down to business.

Take 10-15 minutes each night to write down all of the tasks you need to do the next day and then circle the one that you are most likely to procrastinate or avoid.

So what are you waiting for? ID your Frog.

Welcome

This is my blog. Thanks for stopping by.

If you have any questions or comments feel free to send them to me at Nick@MotivatingPerformanceLLC.com

The Breakfast of Champions

For weeks college and high school students across the nation have been waiting for the arrival of Thanksgiving break. Now, it has come and gone but how nice was the break because if your teachers are anything like mine they assigned you homework and projects to work on since you had plenty of free time this past weekend. Personally I can easily say that this week is by far the busiest of my semester thus far and probably will be for the entire year.

How do you handle those really tough weeks? What allows us to power through the major assignments and projects?

An even more important question is...

What do you have for breakfast each morning?

We have all heard the saying that breakfast is the most important meal of the day. A good healthy breakfast will prepare you to handle the stresses and challenges of the day ahead but too often we eat the wrong thing each morning. Instead of reaching for that box of Wheaties it is time we chow down on the true breakfast of champions. The first thing we need to do each day is... Eat a Frog.

There is an old saying that goes

"If the first thing you do when you wake up each morning is eat a live frog,
nothing worse can happen for the rest of the day."

It is hard to argue with that. A frog is your biggest most difficult task on your to-do list. It is the item that you are most likely to procrastinate. A lot of time we end up putting that item off doing other far less important items which drastically lowers our productivity because we just keep looking at this big green slimy task that is staring back at us. Even when we are working on other important tasks its eyes keep staring; drawing our attention back to it. Not allowing us to keep our focus. An uncompleted task like this physically drains you of energy because we keep thinking about it which causes stress.

That is why each and every day we need to eat our frogs. It will not always be easy. There will be days where you would much rather spend time on facebook or reading the lastest blog posts but summon the will power to tackle that task first and your improvement will be incredible.

In following posts we will take a deeper look at these three steps needed in order to Eat a Frog.

• ID
  
• Plan
  
• Chew
  

Stay tune but for now go get something to eat, you look hungry.

Off to a Great Start

These last two weeks have been very busy but very rewarding. Lots of tests and papers were due but now I am on the downhill slide to finals.

The most exciting part of these two weeks is the progress that has been made with starting my speaking company Motivating Performance. Last Thursday, I had my first official speaking engagement with the UW Sigma Alpha sorority. Also, I have positions on the UW-Madison campus Student Consultant and Speaker's Bureau and ALPs or Adventure Leadership Programs. These two positions are going to allow me to continue to help others understand themselves and grow their leadership ability while still going to school full-time.

I am super excited for Thanksgiving break because I plan to use some of that time to make some changes with this blog and the content that is posted. Be sure to check back in. It will be awesomomenal!!
Sent from my BlackBerry Smartphone provided by Alltel

MMM - Mondays

“I love getting up in the morning. I clap my hands and say, 'This is gonna be a great day.'”
- the late Dicky Fox sports agent in the movie "Jerry Maguire"

It's Monday morning. The first day of the week. So much potential lays in front of us. This week is all about possibilities. We can hang our heads just wishing the weekend would hurry up and come or we can take action. We can take steps and work on tasks that will put us closer to achieving our dreams. We can stop wishing away our days and start living.

Each moment is yours for the taking. What kind of day are you going to have?