Is it Business? Or is it Personal?

By Annabelle Drumm
Over the last few of weeks I’ve been hitting the online dating websites. Rather than being highly discerning I thought I would run it more like an Open Audition and I’ve discovered something really interesting.

So far I’ve talked to men from all walks of life… plus a few hopeful lesbians. They’ve ranged from the height of top lawyers, venture capitalists, executives and entrepreneurs down to truck drivers and apprentices. That range describes their pay packet but doesn’t describe the kind of person they are.

Each had their own hopes and virtues. Each had their own fears and limitations they’d built up over the years. Each looked different from the photo they offered. Each had something marvellous to offer the world.

Each were a lot more similar than you would imagine.

Being a coach, I’m always looking at what’s not being said just as much as the words coming out of their mouths. I noticed from those whose businesses were not going well that there was a huge amount of shame and embarrassment around that. Regardless of what caused their company to fall, their personal relationship hit the rocks soon afterwards and now, here they are on the dating sites.

Very few blamed their wife for leaving because of the money problems. Most women marry with the pure intention of doing so “for better or for worse”. So what was going wrong? Why do marriages fall apart when your business is on the rocks?

My view is it’s a question of “MOJO”. Remember the Austin Powers movies? A man (or a woman) has to have their Mojo back in order for all areas of life to be running smoothly.

If your Business is under strain, the stress can kick in, the tension builds, your vibration lowers and you’re not happy any more at any time of day.

The pressure rises, you spend more hours at work trying to save the sinking ship and neglect the wife. Your frustrations are expressed with a short temper. You’re not sleeping well at night. The stress causes you to make bad decisions which make matters worse. (The processes you need to get around this you’ll find my stress relief course.)

Here’s the clincher.

Part of the Fight or Flight reaction that is inherent with Stress is that your reproduction organ puts itself away on a shelf to save for later. In Fight or Flight, your body is fine-tuned for survival and moves all resources to the most crucial parts of the body – heart, lungs, limbs and the most basic part of the brain.

Adrenalin kicks in, muscles tense and may start to shake, eyes widen, alertness and reaction times quicken. So Libido is now dropped to the bottom of the priority list.

If you live in this state for some period of time, it’s no wonder you lose your sexiness. Even if you go through the motions with your wife, there’s no attention given, no love between you and that’s a real challenge for your partner who usually takes it personally. They wonder, don’t you love me any more?

The question is, is it possible to improve things at work if you get your Mojo back first?

My view is Yes.

Looking at these guys from the dating site, they were ashamed their business had failed. They were looking at me like they were apologising for having no penis at all. Are we really so material that we would judge a person that way? Maybe some women would, but a lot less than you would imagine.

Repeat after me: I am not my business. I am not my possessions.

There’s so much more to you than your work and how much “success” you think you’ve achieved.

Where can you start to get your Mojo back?

Get Angry

When you’re feeling stuck in a rut the most powerful thing you can do is to get moving. If mentally moving is too hard then move physically. Go out for a run, attack a punching bag (not your wife), swim, cycle, climb a rock. I’m not talking about a gentle stroll. I’m talking about pushing yourself to your own limit. (Common sense prevails here of course – make your own decisions for how far you push yourself.) Get those lungs pumping and not only will the extra oxygen expand your muscles and body, it will make a physiological change which can shift your mind towards decisions that need to be made.

When I say getting angry, I mean that too. If you look at the Scale of Emotions the bottom level is feeling fear, depression or powerlessness. By rocking out to some Heavy Metal music (and I believe this is why Heavy Metal has an audience) you lift yourself out of that lowest powerless vibration and it’s a relief to feel anger. Once you’ve been angry for a while – even a few minutes might be enough – you can start to lift yourself further to a more steady emotional level where you can do something about your situation in a constructive way.

Find your Appreciation

By leaving work at work at the end of the day and purposefully changing your point of focus (yes, I know from personal experience this can be a challenge in tough times) you can make time to appreciate all things around you. The people who are there to support you even if they’re just selling you a bottle of water. Those few minutes when the traffic is flowing nicely. The colour of the leaves on a tree. The fact your partner took time to organise dinner for you. The child who is so keen to tell you what they learnt at school today.

Don’t miss all that stuff. It’s there and happening all around you all day every day.

Remember who you are as a Man.

Find your sexiness. Find the personal virtues that make you attractive. When you’re down in the dumps they can be hard to remember, but most women aren’t looking at the size of your wallet to gauge how attractive you are. Surveys show women first look at your eyes and your butt… not at the same time but you get the idea.
They look at your posture – do you stand tall as a man?
Are you confident in yourself?
How generous are you? Not with money but with your attention.
Do you look people in the eye in conversation and really listen to them?
Are you living in the moment?
Do you laugh regularly?
Are you appreciating all around you?

Are you happy? (There’s another article here on what makes men attractive to women.)

By finding yourself as a man again, your Mojo comes back and your partner will be more likely to stay and support you.

You know what else is exciting about this?

With your Mojo back and feeling supported again, your Stress levels drop, you cope better under pressure and your Business decisions become wiser. So you have a much better chance of saving your Business in this state of mind.

Yes, sex and money are deeply linked but the money doesn’t necessarily come first.

That Mojo or sexiness can be priceless in getting your Career or Business back on track. Getting your Libido back makes a difference for everyone around you so many more levels than you can imagine.

Tell me then, what ways can you think of for getting your Mojo back?