Yesterday, I had a great Lunch and Learn with Drew Ebner of Guild Mortgage. It was one of those kicking off the year and getting in the right mindset type of events. One of the topics we touched on was the power of editing out the extra noise and mental clutter that bogs us down.

Imagine your new year business as a clean slate. You have a few ongoing actions you need to take, categories of clients to follow up with and you have a concise plan for doing so. The board is mostly clear with just those few things you need to attend to.

But Then…

• An agent you work with starts talking about this great new CRM she is using and you start to wonder if it is all that she says it is. You start thinking about everything you wish your CRM could do.
• You open your browser to get on the MLS but first notice that there is a conflict happening somewhere in the world and the stock market is taking a hit for the day.
• Your accountant calls and wants to know when you will have your data entered so your taxes can get done.
• Your managing broker has some new rules about file management that need to be implemented this year.
• A buyer that really dominated your time last fall, only to back out of a contract at the last minute because he wasn’t really prepared to commit has left you a message and wants to go back out beginning in February.
• You go on social media to take a break from all of this and agents in your social media group are freaking out about the inventory issues that are predicted for this year plus the competition from other companies, ibuyers, and more.
• Then, as you are browsing your newsfeed, you see an ad pop up for transaction management services and you are already so burned out by all this negative energy pinging you all day that you start to click around to learn more about it and next thing you know, you have wasted 20 minutes confirming what you already knew – that it probably wasn’t the solution for you anyway.

Does this sound like a typical day? Are you getting stressed out just thinking about it?

All of these things cause clutter on your white board. To keep these from taking up space on your board, you need to Raise Your Deflector Shield!

In sci-fi stories, energy fields, called deflector shields, cause things – ships, people, fired shots, asteroids, and anything else to not reach the intended source. It is like the protected thing has an impenetrable bubble of energy around it.

You Need a Deflector Shield!

In order to keep your white board clean and uncluttered, allowing you to focus on only what you need to focus on, you need that same kind of energy field that deflects negativity, worry, fear of missing out, and all these tasks that take up headspace before they need to.

Raising your deflector shield isn’t difficult; but keeping it fully functional takes practice, especially when something is aimed at it.

To practice, imagine an urge to see what is going on in the world pops up and your hands move to open your browser. Stop, allow the urge to pass, and get refocused.

Imagine the agent who was talking to you about the CRM. Instead of taking on the suggestion of checking the new CRM out, you simply say, “thank you,” and walk away. That doesn’t become a to-do list item for you because your CRM functions fine for what you need it to do.

In terms of your managing broker and your accountant? Well, those are just tasks to do. You don’t need to worry about them. They don’t take any mental headspace. Make a note of the task and the due date and move on.

For that buyer who has come back, how can you be proactive and not allow him to take you down the same futile path he did before? By you being a stronger leader in that transaction, talking about what happened, actively searching out any red flags in his response, and indicating what you can and cannot help him with will protect your energy. But make sure you hold to your rules! That is how you raise your deflector shield there.

For the next week, make a concerted effort to be conscious of the number of times you get pulled away from what you are focusing on. When you see yourself opening social media, looking something up online because a thought prompted you to do so, beginning to freak out or worry about something in the news… stop… and remember to raise your deflector shield!

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