The POWER of what YOU say!

Welcome back to New Man New Woman New Week. I am Ben Newman and you know I am fired up every single week to be with you.

Today I want to share a lesson about how important it is to ask questions, to get people to dig down deep in terms of how they connect emotionally to what you sell, how you connect for a relationship, to fire somebody up to go compete in what they do athletically.

So important to connect with people to get them thinking, for them to connect emotionally. We will make this a fun story. A homeless man, sitting in a park.

A beautiful day, gorgeous day, 75 degrees, beautiful wind, trees are fantastic and this homeless man is in a big public park. Sitting against a brick wall. He has a cup for money, his sign says I am hungry, I need food.

People are passing by all day long. Nobody is putting any money into his cup.

Finally this young lady sharp as can be, business suit, smiling, eager for the day, looks down, says hello, gives him a smile, takes a 20 dollar bill out of her pocket and drops it into the bucket. The man looks up, kind of astonished. She gave 20 dollars.

He looks up at her and smiles.

She says, sir, can I see your sign?

He thinks, why wouldn’t I let her take my sign? What are you going to do with it? You just gave me 20 bucks, here is the sign.

She takes the sign, pulls a pen out of her purse, writes something on the back, hands it back and says, try holding it this way. She gives a smile, told him to have a blessed day.

The homeless man holds the sign exactly the way the woman told him to.

Would you believe, everybody is now stopping by and putting something in his cup. Pennies, quarters, dimes, dollars.

Almost everybody.

You know what the sign says now?

“Imagine if you were hungry?”

That is the difference.

Do you focus on being intentional in how you communicate with others?

The reality is, this is embellishing, nobody cares about you or me. People want to know, are you willing to connect with them, dig down deep, emotionally understand what is going on with somebody?

Do you really care about me?

Do things for the right reasons. Be a great listener, build real relationships, connect emotionally.

What was the different for the homeless man? Now the individual reads the sign and actually was connecting to, what if I was hungry?

What if I were in his shoes?

What would I do?

Connect with people emotionally, be intentional in your communication, it makes a huge difference in all we do. Competing on a court, on a field, in a boardroom or in the kitchen with somebody you love.

Focus on communication, emotionally connect. It might the difference for you to grow stronger relationships in your life. Until next week, for New Man New Woman New Week, go do great things.