Heather Porter share her favorite Mindset Book

Laura: Heather, over the course of coaching so many thousands of people, it’s been really interesting – And I don’t know if you’ve had the same experience – but what I’ve seen is that there are a lot of people out there that have great business skills meaning they’ve learned their craft, but they’ve been so focused on their craft that they haven’t gotten their mind right.

 

Heather: Most people.

 

Laura: Yeah, most people. It’s so scary. So I am wondering a.) what your take on that is, and then b.) what is a favorite book or resource that you recommend to people so that they can adjust their mindset and treat it as importantly as they do their other business skills?

 

Heather: Well, let’s start with what my take is on it.

 

So first of all, I find that either, like you suggested, there’s people that are so focused on their business and their professional, I guess, drive inside of them that they stop to focus on their mindset so they’re swinging on that side a little bit too far.

 

But there’s the opposite side as well. There’s a lot of people out there that become obsess with studying mindset that they actually forget how to get results. So they’re stuck on that whole thing of speaking the right language and looking at goal setting, and so much so they’re too far the other way. But I think that’s the nature of the world and humanity anyway, so we can kind of go too far other way.

 

So sitting in the middle, I think it is absolutely key where you have the actions and the results and the drive, but you also are constantly looking at your performance.

 

And recently, Laura, I’ve spoken to a couple of different performance experts which has been really interesting. They actually are sitting in the athletic industry so an ex-Olympian, somebody that coaches top athletes. And what I love about what they say is that you have to definitely visualize and see where you’re headed, but you have to work really, really hard to get there, and there’s no shortcuts. You got to see it. You got to keep it in your mind. And you got to work hard which is where it ties right back into the book I’m about to say.

 

So the book that I love – And you know what, I think I’ve only read it once, and I read it way back years ago, but it still stays with me and I still, you know, use it when I’m just talking to people in general – is The Alchemist by Paolo Coelho. Have you ever read that one?

 

Laura: You know what, I have not. It is one of those books that I’ve had on the list for years, and I just never have.

 

Heather: The reason why I love it, and the thing I remember most from it is it’s a beautiful story about a boy who wants to see the pyramids, and it’s the whole story about how he ultimately gets there. I mean he has no money. He’s, you know, lives in poverty, and it kind of talks about how he sets the goal and he sets this idea, and then the universe just gets together to get him there.

 

But there’s a key message in there that I actually think is the most important, and that is the closest and the closer you get to your actual goal and what you want to achieve the harder it gets.

 

And most people fall out right before the moment they achieve it because that’s when it gets the hardest, that’s when it gets the darkest and that’s where it’s easiest to give up. And so this book has a beautiful message for that way all of us that are entrepreneurs and who want to grow our own business the fact that there are going to be really hard times, but perhaps in those moments, that’s when you have to get through it because you’re just so close to actually being where you want to be.