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Positive energy gives optimism, trust, enthusiasm, love, purpose, joy, passion, and spirit to live, work, and perform at a higher level; to build and lead successful teams; to overcome adversity in life and at work; to share contagious energy with employees, colleagues, and customers; to bring out the best in others and in yourself; and to overcome all the negative people (the “energy vampires”) and negative situations that threaten to sabotage your health, family, team, and success.
Too many people are overstressed, overtired, and overworked. One bus driver tried to be an “Energy Ambassador,” who energized everyone who came on her bus. That’s why she called her ride the Energy Bus.
It was ironic how the people who needed help the most were often the most closed off from receiving it.
Every one of us has challenges. Everyone who comes on the bus has problems. Some have marriage problems, health problems, family problems, work problems, and some have all kinds of problems. It’s part of life.
Here are 10 rules for the ride of your life:
Rule #1 You’re the Driver of Your Bus.
We are all driving on each other’s bus but each one of us has our own bus. The problem today is that people feel like they have no say where their bus is going or how it’s going to get there.
It’s been said that more people die on Monday morning at 9 a.m. than any other time.
You don’t have to sit passively by like so many other unhappy souls who let life create them. You can take the wheel and choose to create your life, one thought, one belief, one action, one choice at a time. It’s your bus and you’re the driver and you choose where you are going and the kind of ride it’s going to be.
You chose to smile and just by doing that one thing, you changed your energy. A smile changes the way you feel, the way you think, and how you interact with others. The energy you fuel the ride of your life with is entirely up to you.
Every journey and ride begins with a desire to go somewhere and do something and if you have a desire then you also have the power to make it happen.
First, decide what you want. Then you can start creating it. Don’t let the world create you. You create your world.
There is an energy to thought and when you identify what you desire and write down your vision, you begin the process of mobilizing the energy to create the life you want. After all you can’t go somewhere if you don’t have a vision of where you want to go.
Unfortunately, it takes a crisis for so many to change. As Gordon put it, “I wish more people wouldn’t wait for everything to fall apart before they start thinking about their life and what they want. They don’t have to wait, you know. But sometimes that’s what it takes. Sometimes we have to see what we don’t want, to know what we do want.”
Every crisis offers an opportunity to grow stronger and wiser; to reach deep within and discover a better you that will create a better outcome.
Rule #2 Desire, Vision, and Focus Move Your Bus in the Right Direction.
Each day, you should focus on your vision for 10 minutes and see yourself creating everything you wrote down on that paper. That’s the law of energy. The law of attraction says that the more we focus on something, the more we think about something, the more it shows up in our lives.
It’s important that you spend your time thinking about what you do want rather than what you don’t want. You’ve got to focus.
When you complain you get more things to complain about. Stop thinking about what you don’t want and start focusing your energy on your vision and what you do want.
If you want to change your situation you must first change your thoughts.
Consider the equation: E + P = O
- E = Events in your life
- P = Perception
- O = Outcome
We can’t control the events in our life but we can control how we perceive them and our perception and response to the events determine our outcome.
The P can also stand for positive energy, and this formula explains why positive energy is so important. Positive energy and positive people create positive results. There is certainly a lot of negativity in the world and choosing positive energy helps us deal with the negative people and negative situations that can knock us off course.
Rule #3 Fuel Your Ride with Positive Energy.
Desire, vision, and focus help you turn the bus in the right direction but positive energy is necessary to take you where you want to go. Every day when we look at the gas pump of life we have a choice between positive energy and negative energy.
Positive energy is high octane fuel for the ride of your life while negative energy causes sludge to accumulate in your energy pipeline. Where there is a negative there is always a positive. Where there is a dark cloud, there is always a sun shining behind it.
Being grateful floods the body and brain with positive endorphins and emotions and combined with walking is a powerful energy booster. Consider taking a “Thank You Walk” to consider the blessings in your life.
After people play a round of golf they usually don’t think about all the bad shots they made but rather always remember and focus on the one great shot they had that day. The thought and feeling they get when thinking about this shot makes them want to play again and again; this is why so many people get addicted to golf.
Contrast this approach with life and how people often go to bed thinking about all the things that went wrong when instead they should apply the “one great golf shot” theory to their life and think about the one great thing that happened that day. The one great call, meeting, or sale; the one great conversation or interaction; the one great success that will inspire them to look forward to creating more success tomorrow.
Rule #4 Invite People on Your Bus and Share Your Vision for the Road Ahead.
There’s no better way to get people on your bus than telling them where you are going and asking them to get on.
Life is always going to knock you down. The important thing is you got to get back up. The Gallup Poll estimates that there are 22 million negative workers in the United States costing around $300 billion in productivity a year!
Self-doubt, fear, hopelessness, and negative energy drain you and sabotage everything you want in life and all the success you desire.
Rule #5 Don’t Waste Your Energy on Those Who Don’t Get on Your Bus.
Some people are going to get on your bus and some people won’t. Don’t worry about the people who don’t get on your bus. Don’t waste your energy on them. Don’t try to make them get on. The more energy you spend worrying about the people who didn’t get on your bus, the less you will have for the people who are on your bus.
Your success and life are so important that you must surround yourself with a positive support team.
There are people who increase your energy and there are people who drain your energy. The people who drain your energy are “Energy Vampires” and they will suck the life out of you and your goals and vision if you let them.
Rule #6 Post a Sign That Says NO ENERGY VAMPIRES ALLOWED on Your Bus.
You give people a chance to change and if they don’t get it then you got to kick them off the bus. Or else they will ruin your ride.
Your positive energy and vision must be greater than anyone’s and everyone’s negativity. Your certainty must be greater than everyone’s doubt.
Positive energy is like muscle. The more you use it the stronger it gets. The stronger it gets the more powerful you become. Repetition is the key and the more you focus on positive energy the more it becomes your natural state.
Emotions can lift you up or bring you down. E-motion stands for energy in motion and your emotional state is all about how the energy is flowing through you. So instead of letting negative emotions take you down a dark road of negativity, sadness, and despair we can take control of our emotions, charge ourselves up, and let the positive energy flow.
The gifts you bring to the world are not found in your resume, accomplishments, or presents to others. The gift is your presence of feeling good and being happy and bringing this to others. Being around happy and positive people makes people feel happy and positive.
God keeps breaking your heart until it opens. Every struggle, every challenge, every adversity brings you closer to your heart, to your true self, to who you really are. Sometimes you got to be broken down to the point where you feel powerless to discover your ultimate and true power.
The heart acts as an emotional conductor and radiates how you are feeling to every cell in the body via the heart’s electromagnetic field; this energy field can be detected up to 5 to 10 feet away. The heart’s electromagnetic field is 5,000 times more powerful than the brain.
CEO doesn’t stand for chief executive officer anymore. It stands for Chief Energy Officer. Why energy? Because energy is the currency of personal and professional success today. If you don’t have it you can’t lead, inspire, or make a difference.
Deciding to become a Chief Energy Officer means that you share positive, powerful, and contagious energy with your co-workers, employees, and customers! It means you communicate from the heart.
Research says that emotional intelligence is responsible for 80 percent of adult success.
Rule #7 Enthusiasm Attracts More Passengers and Energizes Them During the Ride.
Chief Energy Officers live and work with enthusiasm. They tap the power of their heart by getting excited about being alive, by filling up with loads of positive energy, and by being optimistic about life and work.
Enthusiasm comes from the Greek word entheos, which means “inspired” or “filled with the divine.” When you get excited and enthusiastic about your life and work you bring this powerful divine energy to everything you do, and people notice.
When you live and work with enthusiasm, people are drawn to you like moths to a light. Walt Whitman said that we convince by our presence, and when you are enthusiastic you project an energy that convinces people to get on and stay on your bus.
Negative people often tend to create negative cultures whereas positive corporate cultures are created by positive people. The energy of a company or team is cultivated by the energy and enthusiasm of the leaders and each person in the organization who contributes to the collective energy and culture of it.
Daniel Goleman, author of Emotional Intelligence, explains that a positive company with a positive corporate culture will outperform their negative counterparts every time. It’s also important to note that if you would invest in the companies voted the best places to work, where people are full of positive energy and enthusiasm, you would significantly outperform the stock market averages.
Rule #8 Love Your Passengers.
LOVE IS THE ANSWER.—GOD.
Enthusiasm is important. But love is the answer. Your team want to know that you care about them. They want to know that you are concerned about their future and welfare. They need to know that you love them. It can’t be just about you and your job. It also has to be about them.
Love takes time. It’s a process not a goal. Love is something that needs to be nurtured. But if there is one thing you should start immediately, it’s focus on bringing out the best in each person on your team.
Here are five ways to love your passengers:
1. Make Time for Them—When you love someone or something, you spend time with them.
2. Listen to Them—One of the most important factors that determines a high management approval rating is whether the manager listens to the employee. Empathy is the key. When employees feel seen and heard, there is a moistening in the eyes. Yet researchers estimate that in more than 95 percent of daily interactions there is no moistening in the eyes, according to High Energy Living, by Robert K. Cooper.
3. Recognize Them—We honor them for who they are and what they do. Recognize them as a person as much as a business professional.
4. Serve Them—A great leader once said, the higher you get in an organization the more it is your duty to serve the people below you rather than having the people below serve you.
5. Bring Out the Best in Them—We saved this one for last because it’s the most important. You want to bring out the best in them. Thus the best way any leader can demonstrate their love for their team is to help each person discover their strengths and provide an opportunity for that person to utilize them.
Chief Energy Officers overcome challenges by charging forward with trust and optimism.
Rule #9 Drive with Purpose.
There’s no spirit in companies anymore because there’s no spirit in the people who work for these companies. Shared purpose keeps a team energized and together.
Instead of telling the team your bigger purpose and vision, let your team formulate a shared purpose and vision together. Rather than being told what their purpose and vision should be, it is more powerful, meaningful, and inspiring if the team formulates what they want it to be.
We all have fear but the key to success is that your trust is bigger than your fear. A little fear is good but it is weak energy. It runs out. Trust is the high-octane fuel that will take your bus wherever it needs to go.
All of us focus so much on what stresses us that we forget all the things we got to be thankful for. So when you head into that meeting today don’t be stressed. Instead feel blessed. If you really started counting your blessings you would realize that they are greater than the stars in the sky.
Rule #10 Have Fun and Enjoy the Ride.
Too many people stress over too many meaningless things.
One study asked a bunch of ninety-five-year-olds if they could do it all over again and live their life again what would they do differently. The three things that almost all of them said were:
1. They would reflect more. Enjoy more moments. More sunrises and sunsets. More moments of joy.
2. They would take more risks and chances. Life is too short not to go for it.
3. They would have left a legacy. Something that would live on after they die.
Don’t go through life with regrets. Don’t be someone who looks back and says I should have done this or that. Live and work like you have nothing to lose and everything to gain. Act like a kid on Christmas morning that is always optimistic and excited about the gifts you are receiving. Don’t be too stressed to feel blessed.
Life is a test. Every adversity helps us grow. Negative events and people teach us what we don’t want so we can focus our energy on what we do want.
The Energy Bus Action Plan
• Step 1: Create Your Vision
• Step 2: Fuel Your Vision with Purpose
• Step 3: Write Down Your Vision/Purpose Statement
• Step 4: Focus on Your Vision
• Step 5: Zoom Focus
• Step 6: Get on the Bus
• Step 7: Fuel the Ride with Positive Energy and Enthusiasm
• Step 8: Post a Sign that Says “No Energy Vampires Allowed”
• Step 9: Navigate Adversity and Potholes
• Step 10: Love Your Passengers
• Step 11: Have Fun and Enjoy the Ride
Remind yourself and your team that the goal of every journey should be to arrive at your destination with a smile on your face. It’s not just about the destination but about the team you become along the way. Remember, you have only one ride through life so give it all you got and enjoy the ride.
