What is the first step in improving your personal brand? One of my personal inspirations, the late great motivational speaker and author Zig Ziglar, said it was “a check up from the neck up.”
In other words, an attitude adjustment. That means a brand new you and a new you brand.
“Most people, when trying to achieve greater success, don’t realize that it’s very important to work on having a great attitude every day,” says author and motivational speaker Boaz Rauchwerger. “The main difference between average and those who create exceptional outcomes is attitude. We alter our lives by altering our attitudes.”
He is known to his audiences by just his first name: Boaz (think Cher, Pele or Madonna).
Boaz is an internationally known high-performance coach. He is the Speaker of the Year for Vistage International, the world's largest organization of CEO's.
He has known scarcity and abundance. And learned valuable lessons from both conditions.
For more than two decades, Boaz has led thousands of seminars nationally and internationally on goal setting, empowerment, and self-esteem. A highly respected consultant who counts among his clients such companies as American Airlines and Xerox, he has taught over half a million people how to transform their lives and careers. I am fortunate to say I am one of those.
We met when we had a mutual client. He generously coached me as a gift. When times became really tough in my business life, Boaz taught me: “A leader does what has to be done, when it has to be done, whether they feel like it or not.” Those are words to live by.
“Before making you a branding expert, I believe we have to work on your attitude, and make sure that you are a great example of what your brand represents,” says Boaz.
“Every day, when we wake up, we subconsciously choose an attitude, whether positive or negative. Unfortunately, it’s easier to choose a negative attitude because that gives us the excuse to not take the important steps that can take our life to the next level.”
His own life is a study in rebirth and reinvention. Boaz's parents escaped the Holocaust in Europe by going to Palestine in 1935. Around the time of his first birthday, Palestine became a new country, Israel. His father was a carpenter and they lived by the sea of Galilee.
Then the family emigrated to America in the 1950s during the Arab-Israeli conflict.
While growing up in Oklahoma, Boaz wanted a career in broadcasting. He not only had to learn English, but to teach himself to speak it without an accent. He credits his mother with many of his great life lessons about becoming a brand new you.
According to Boaz, attitude is the way you see your life – your experiences, your opportunities, your challenges, your choices and your responses. It is the direction that you move at any given moment. Your attitude either builds up your life or tears it down.
“Whether you’re winning or losing is determined by your attitude,” says Boaz. “Losers see the loss of a job as the end of the road. Winners see an opportunity to find a better job or start a business of their own. Losers look at a rainy day and see their outdoor plans ruined. Winners see an opportunity to go singing in the rain. Winners embrace life with a wonderful positive attitude. Losers let life’s challenges bring them down.”
Boaz is an inspiring author, lecturer, and humorist whose driving passion is to transform lives. He believes that happiness, success, and wealth are matters of personal choice and action, and he has made it his life's mission to teach others how to pursue them.
Here is a game changer: Years ago Boaz encouraged me to read from two books on a daily basis: How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie and Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill. I recommend the practice to anyone who wants to succeed at a higher level.
I also recommend Boaz's new book that he wrote to help people improve their careers and life, which is titled How to Become Brand New. In addition to attitude ideas, this book is a compilation of highly-productive branding ideas that Boaz has tested with over 25,000 CEO's worldwide. Some of these ideas have been worth millions of dollars to companies who've used them.
“A great attitude begins with a smile,” says Boaz. “Even if you don’t feel like it, fake it. It’ll make you feel better. In fact, it takes fewer facial muscles to smile than it does to frown. Be a beacon of warm, positive feelings to others, and those rays of sunshine will come back to shine brightly on you. You will then attract people with a similar positive attitude.”
What’s the difference between average people and those who are very successful?
“Champions choose to think and behave differently,” says Boaz.
