The Last Week of the Year

So here we are with the final podcast of 2017. It’s the last week of the year and I’m back with a few recommendations on how we can start planning for our best year ever!

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This podcast is being posted on December 26th, the day after Christmas. I feel hungover and I wasn’t even drinking. What’s up with that?

I hope you enjoyed, or better yet, are still enjoying the holiday season. I love the last week of the year. It’s a great time to relax and reflect on the year gone by. It’s also a great time to prepare for the madness that is the January trade show season.

I’ll be conducting training at the ASI Show in Orlando on Tuesday, January 2nd, the PPAI Expo in Las Vegas on Monday, January 15th and the ASI Show in Dallas on Wednesday, January 24th. We’ll also have a booth at each of those shows. Booth number 1459 in Orlando, 3762 in Las Vegas and 1141 in Dallas. Mention this podcast and get a free audio CD training of your choice (we have two different ones to choose from this year.) Just look for the Top Secrets of Promotional Products Sales or AIM SmartEQP logos on the booth and I’ll look forward to seeing you there.

So back to this week — the week between Christmas and New Year’s Day. It’s just such a nice time to look back on the previous year, celebrate the wins, reflect on the losses and plan for the future!

Ah yes, planning. There’s an old Yiddish proverb that says, “Man Plans, and God Laughs.” There’s a military expression which says, “No plan survives contact with the enemy.” and then there’s Mike Tyson who said “Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face.”

So, plans don’t always work out. But plan we do, and plan we must!

Our plans are a good way to get in touch with what we really want, and regardless of whether or not we get it, that is tremendously valuable. Just taking the time to consider, “what would I love to have happen in the coming year” can fill us with hope and possibility. It’s fun… and exciting.

Then, we take it a step further and ask, “Okay, what do I need to DO in order to make sure this actually happens?” This gets us thinking about our activities, our daily actions — what we’ll do better and differently in the New Year to ensure better and different results.

It’s also a great time to decide what gets to come along with us into the New Year. Which experiences will we remember fondly and call upon when we need strength? Which experiences can we learn from the most? Which experiences forged our character this year? And which experiences do we plan to forget about — abandon to the dunghill of history?

We get to decide, and that is awesome.

We can bring along the pride of our success and the lessons of our failures, without having to take along the failures themselves. We can leave those behind. We can take along the memories of those we lost and celebrate the time we had together with them. We can take along our most important relationships, to strengthen them and to build upon them. We can jettison our old mental baggage and look forward with anticipation to the new people we’ll meet, places we’ll visit and events that have yet to unfold.

The last week of the year is an awesome time to do all these things. But then again, so is any day ending with a “y.”

Thank you so much for listening to this podcast, or for reading the post. We have the very best clients in the world. If you are one of them, thank you so much for being a part of what we’ve built and continue to build here. If you’re not one of them, I hope you’ll consider joining us. We’re very clear about who we’re here to serve. If you’re smart, focused and committed to doing what it takes to succeed, you’re in the right place. If you’re not, well, you probably wouldn’t have listened or read to this point.

Either way, I hope you enjoy the remaining days of 2017 and I wish you the very best in the new year. If you’re coming to any of the industry shows, I look forward to seeing you in Orlando, Las Vegas or Dallas and if not, I’ll catch you back here for the first podcast of 2018. Thanks for listening.

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