Latest / Travel Agency in a Year / Day 272: Mindset Reframe Tactics CEOs Practice
Transcript
- Rachel: Welcome to the Travel Agency in a Year podcast. I'm your host, Rachel K with elevate with Rachel K.com. That came out weird, sorry. My throat was being weird, so I just started singing the word with. I'm a travel agency owner, and I am here doing this podcast along with some mentoring and other programs. Like I said, over at elevatewithrachelk.com to help you like truly build a business. Not some side hustle. And I am I will fight you on this. I'm not gonna talk about it. We're not gonna talk about this episode. Anyway, I want you to build a business that's multiple six figures. I mean, if that's what you want. You can stay under that. That's fine too. But just know it's totally doable to make two three hundred a year in gross revenues without killing yourself, without the burnout, and actually build a career. All right, today is day 272. The mindset reframes tactics CEOs practice. Rachel, why do you talk about all this stuff? Great question. this is part of my college education was organizational development and leadership studies. And mindset is a huge thing. Psychocology is a huge thing. I had to study business. General business, marketing, psychology, sociology, leadership, all of this stuff just to get my janky little bachelor's degree. And I've noticed a lot of travel advisors aren't being taught this basic to me, sorry, to me, basic information to run a business. So that's why I like talking about this stuff. Alright. Day 272. Every CEO, regardless of the industry, which you should be working towards becoming the CEO and hopefully stepping out of your business fully, deals with the same basic challenge. The thoughts about a situation shape their decisions just as much as the situation itself does. Ooh, we're gonna look at some reframing techniques worth building into your own thinking. Pa pa ba! Cognitive reframing is the foundation. So much of this rests on a concept from cognitive behavioral therapy developed, go ask your therapist, I don't care, developed significantly by psychiatrist Aaron Beck. And it is the idea that our emotional response to an event is shaped less by the event itself and more by the specific thought or interpretation we attach to it. I actually just drafted a post. today for social that also ties in, I believe it was Marcus Aurelius wrote something very similar. And I also did a theology of the body crash course. And I believe St. John Paul II brings this up. So this is like a pretty standard thing. Even spiritually, if you practice stoicism, I believe all three of them reference this. So let me repeat that. The idea that our emotional response to an event is shaped less by the event itself and more by the specific thought or interpretation that we attach to it. So two travel advisors can experience the exact same slow week. One interprets it as proof I'm failing, while the other interprets it as a normal fluctuation in seasonal business. The same exact event, dramatically different emotional experience, and often dramatically different next actions. The first travel advisor is probably going to frantically, with their scarcity mindset, start researching what's wrong with me and who do I need to. hire to fix this. And then maybe make some financial investment quote unquote decisions. That might not get them the ROI they need. Ooh, bum bum bum. I don't know why I do that I need the law and order gavel. Beep beep That's my law and order my law and order sound is a child's car horn. Beep beep man. Okay. So I kinda I need to p regroup a little bit. So some reframes worth practicing from this is happening to me to this is information for me. If you've been listening to this podcast, I have done, and I think it's in the success circle as well. I've done so much content of reframing this. This is foundational, like mental reframing. This is happening to me to this is information for me. So cancel trip, slow month, difficult client. The passive victim-frame version of these events tends to produce helplessness. And then you might make poor financial decisions. You might decide that I need to go pick up some extra work at another job instead of whoa, slow down here. What can we do to fix this in the business? And so you're looking at it from very much a fear-based perspective. And I believe days 74 to 85 in the podcast all talk about the fears that we all go through as we're building our travel business. So the active information framed version is gonna produce useful next steps, not throw money at the problem, not run away from the problem. and that That goes data without the drama conversation that happened a few weeks ago on this podcast. during the quarterly review series. Okay. Ooh, I love this one. I love this one. Change the phrase from I have to to I get to. I don't know how many travel agents I have told them. You don't say have to anymore, you say get to. There are so many small linguistic shifts that you can make that are well documented in like the mindset and motivation research because your words matter so much that These little tiny word changes changes the felt experience of any task considerably. I have to do outreach today creates a subtle sense of obligation and resentment, if you can't tell by my tone. I get to reach out to people I could genuinely help today. That reframes the exact same action around choice and purpose. You're welcome. That's like years of therapy and hiring coaches. I'm kidding. Changing those little words. Other words that I don't like to hear is try, like Yoda, do or do not. There is no try. Take try out of your language. I also don't like the word but because it negates everything that you just said. I love booking trips for clients, especially cruises, but no you don't. You're lying. And I also don't like the phrase, if I could be honest. Well, you weren't being honest before. From I have to to I get to. I have to post content just to get business. my god. Does that sound like an adult? No. I get to share my message and hopefully genuinely connect with potential clients. Potentially lifetime clients. That's I know you're probably thinking this sounds like a toxic positivity spiral. Just do it. Just do it. Okay. Another one from why is this happening? Why is this happening to me? To what is this teaching me? The first question tends to loop without resolution when you play the victim and you blame it. Why is this happening? Why is this happening to me? Because that supplier sucks. Because that client is an idiot. I'm the victim here, and I can take zero accountability to what is this teaching me? What am I doing? And what can I learn from this to never have this experience again? Or if I do experience in the future, how can I mitigate this exact scenario from repeating? What is this teaching me about myself? Do I lack boundaries? Did I did I book a trip I didn't have enough knowledge on? It could be as simple as that. have I taken on too much business and now I couldn't serve my clients well enough, and this created this conflict here. Regardless of what happens to you. You are being taught a lesson. If it's not a blessing, it's a lesson. And I would highly recommend, I'm not putting in the description because I will forget because I batch record these episodes. Checking out the book The Courage to Be Disliked. I had to deal with Some pretty hard stuff in my personal life and when I read Chapter True Chapter True Chapter True When I read Chapter Two I believe it was Chapter Two, I had to put that book down and walk away for probably six or eight weeks. But the title of the chapter was something to the effect of trauma isn't real. And I was like, you liar. I just shut the book and I was like, it is real. I had to come back and be like, okay, what is this teaching me? Trauma is a thing and what it says in that chapter from what I remember, I could be totally wrong. If you've read it, please comment. But it is y like I was it earlier in this episode. It's how you choose to interpret the event and live with it over and over again rather than processing it. And sometimes you need help processing it. I'm not saying that you can't you can do it all alone and just mindset your way out of nightmare mode. That sounds crazy. Just believe everything's fine. No, sometimes you need help. But everything is the opportunity to teach you something, whether it's good or bad. Okay? That's what I want you to take away from why this happening to me to what is this teaching me? Okay. Alright. From comparison. the comparison trap, which I know we've done episodes about this way back in the day, to your own baseline. Instead of measuring a decision or result against your competition or just another advisor's highlight reel, measure it against your own business three months or a year ago. Preferably a year ago because your business is going to be seasonal, right? But if you're newer, just measure it against three months ago. This is a direct practical Application of the comparison convo from day 225 of the Travel Agency in a year podcast. and this should be considered a mindset habit rather than just like a one-time reminder. This is why I say like keep your head down and focus on what you want to offer, especially if you have an issue of like comparing yourself to others. Now, I also firmly believe in creating a villain. Okay, so let's go back to the concept we've been discussing the few past few days. The challenge, the covenant, and the or sorry, the challenge, the client, and the covenant. The client is the hero of the story, the covenant is the promise you as the sage guide makes to the client to make them the hero of the story. The end result, the happy ending, is the hero gets to go on an amazing trip. Whatever it is you need to. Now What who would be the villain in this story? If you want the villain to be you can always have a villain in your own story. And I always also say everyone becomes a villain in everyone's story at some point. But if you're struggling with that comparison stuff, like and it's someone that you really want to be like and maybe you admire a little bit, no don't necessarily hate them, but use them as motivation to be like, I'm gonna beat you. Make them a villain a little bit. They're not a bad person, you probably don't even know them. Just kind of make them a little bit of a villain. Spice it up. Anyway. So These mindset reframes, that's not something you do once and you're like, I've permanently mastered this. It's a constant practice. Just like developing confidence. You have to constantly be booking travel to develop confidence as a travel advisor. You have to constantly be marketing travel to develop confidence as someone who can understand sales and marketing. Anyway, it's most useful in the actual moment a difficult thought shows up. But you might want to do some practicing with it too. But a simple habit. When you notice a thought that feels like heavy or discouraging, pause and ask, is there another equally true way to interpret this? If you haven't listened to past episodes, I talk about this a lot because it's so important. Often there genuine genuinely is an equally true way to interpret whatever it is you're experiencing, and simply noticing that the discouraging interpretation isn't the only available option. It'll loosen its grip on you. You're not gonna feel so trapped. Because that's fear. Fear is the enemy. It's worth being clear that reframing isn't about pretending a hard situation is actually fine. I don't have my coffee mug, but I have that I'm sure you've seen the gif. It's a little dog with a hat and the house is on fire, and he's just sitting there with a smile, and he's like, This is fine with this coffee cup. Don't do that. Don't do that. We're not pretending things are not hard. Things are gonna be hard, you will be suffering, it's fine, it's gonna happen regardless of what you do in your life. That's just a fact of being an adult. and we're not forcing artificial positivity onto something genuinely difficult. Like you can't get into a horrible car wreck and become like a double amputee and instantly be like, yeah, this is great. You have to learn how to get to that mindset of like I'm Missing my legs. Like I have to readjust my entire life and I have to learn how to live with this whole new situation. And it's gonna be really hard. That's fine. I mean it's not fine. But what I'm saying is no fake positivity, no toxic posity, and no ignoring something is actually hard when it's really fine. It's about noticing your specific interpretation of an event, not the event itself. Is that the thing that's making a hard situation feel unnecessarily worse? And then choosing possibly a more accurate and more useful interpretation instead. And that does take practice. And you are allowed to be like, I'm not ready to choose that more accurate interpretation at this moment in time. Or maybe you're like, yes, there is a more yeah, I don't want to choose that right now. I'm still dealing with this hard situation. And that's okay. So it's not okay if you live with it the rest of your life like that. But it's okay if you're practicing this at first. And you're like, I know it's another option, but I choose to stay here, make things unnecessarily worse. I'm not ready for that yet. That's okay. That's another piece of data. It's okay. All right, recap time. Practice the shift from happening to me to information for me. I have to to I get to from why is this happening to what's the lesson here and from external comparison to only comparing based on your last quarter. You are only good as your last quarter or your last year. That's it. You can pass well beyond that in the future, but you cannot compare yourself to anyone else in the industry. Build the habit of pausing on heavy thought to ask whether another equally true interpretation exists. And remember that this is about accuracy, not forced positivity. Whew, we're gonna go even further and aligning your personal life vision with your business tomorrow. Thank you for joining today. Have a wonderful day.