Tony Brazier

www.braziers.co.nz

Tony Brazier

The Press - Wednesday 27 January 2010

Fail to Plan, Plan to Fail

So it’s that time of year when we all should be equipped with our newly formed promises of better habits and hopes of increased fortunes by year’s end. In my selling career I have come to rely on these resolutions made over the annual break, as clients and customers return with at least some of them having resolved to start or increase activity in their career as a property investor.

Embarking or increasing upon one’s activity as an investor should involve a period or two of clear thinking about what it is one wants to achieve. This is where I’ve seen the making of fortunes through property by those who know what goal setting is compared to those who don’t, and who then blame the process and not themselves for a lack of luck and opportunity.

In a previous career as a teacher I thought I knew what goal setting was. I didn’t. Most people interpret setting a goal as creating a plan by which to achieve particular outcomes. It is so much more than this. Planning to view a certain number of listings, decorate a particular number of flats or organising some tactical refinancing is just that, a plan. Goal setting is ever so slightly mystical in comparison and is best done without wearing the judge’s robe as to what is possible and impossible to one’s own mind.

here are some pertinent lessons to be learned when planning one’s investment career from goal setting gurus that can be the difference between achieving those goals and looking back on the experience as a huge waste of time.

Many investors sabotage their chances by the way they think and by what they let enter their minds that affects the way they think. The classic is that, “No-one else I know in my family or friends has done this,” or “I wouldn’t be comfortable being that wealthy”. These beliefs, usually given to us by our upbringing, are limiting, as in reality if anyone has ever succeeded in what you want, then why can’t you. Most of us hold onto beliefs that should be cast off as someone else’s, as obsolete, for these beliefs create our attitudes towards life. If you don’t feel worthy, be it in trying to lose weight or gain wealth you’ll never achieve it as you are in fact creating the reality you don’t want by the way you are thinking.

We as investors, especially over this economic transition period, must be very wary as to what we allow to enter into our heads. We’ve been so badly beaten up by media reports of doom, that has never actually happened, one now has to wonder what this negativity cost us all in real dollar terms. Weed your mental garden of rubbish thought, for these thoughts if held, create those all – important beliefs. After all, what possible good comes from holding negative thoughts about anything, especially when you discover that this is exactly what draws you to what it is you don’t want?

In kayaking, they talk about “rock consciousness”. That is concentrating so hard on where you don’t want to go you are drawn towards it. Therefore, word your goals as to what you want to achieve, not what you want to avoid. Your mind doesn’t relate to negatives, it can only see the picture of what you mean and draw you towards it.

Weed your thoughts, choose your beliefs and create new habits through your change in attitude and then take the action according to these new found habits.

This is now the stage you can plan out what action to take. Taking action with a strong belief of success behind you is like standing in front of an automatic door and finally stepping to go through it. The opportunities it opens up may be endless but they won’t become apparent unless you step out in that leap of faith.

The actions you take from the beliefs you have will create results that, if done with expectation, should lead to the success of achieving the goal you set. This success, or otherwise, determines what thoughts you have about this whole cyclical process. Nothing breeds success like success, so start small with your goals and get into the habit of achieving them. All successful investors have done this in one form or another whether they knew it or not. The most successful of which just think with a few extra zeros on the end than most of us.

Here endith the lesson.