Joshes and Joshettes, less than eighteen hours ago I was having a profound conversation and the topic of perception came up. I’ve done posts in the past about cup half empty and half full but never about perception in general. Get ready for a post that can literally change the way you see the world.

Perception is defined by the Cambridge dictionary as a thought, belief, or opinion, often held by many people and based on appearances. I know you didn’t come here to learn the definition of perception but the end of the definition stands out. The end of the definition makes it seem that the majority of people see things a certain way which is fine unless you want to be different. The one major characteristic that many entrepreneurs share is the ability to see the world differently. Where others might see a problem and give up, entrepreneurs see a challenge or rather an opportunity. One handyman was soo sick and tired of throwing all his tools in a bucket and lugging them around that he decided to make a tool belt for the bucket. That might sound comical, but this person has done over a million in sales and this product solves a real issue. Before starting Walmart, Sam Walton ran a franchise store and after getting screwed over he decided to go against the normal retail philosophy and opened his own store. His philosophy was to sell items ate the lowest price possible and to make up for the low-profit margin he would sell large quantities. This worked amazing for him and Walmart is still a retail powerhouse today.

I know that not everyone reading this wants to be an entrepreneur, and don’t worry perception can help you in your day to day life. A perfect example of using perception in our daily life is Tony Robbin’s view on saving a failing marriage. According to him if you treat the relationship as if it was new aka at the beginning then there will be no end. In simpler terms instead of viewing your relationship as a dying one perceive it as a brand new relationship and act accordingly. Think about what would happen if you applied this same principle in your workplace. I know working for the same company for many years drains your spirits but people especially customers and clients can read emotions. Try to remember how great you felt when you started your job, did you look forward to each day? Were you a go-getter that everyone noticed? Try treating your job as if it was a new job and see how you feel, I did this in the past and it worked wonders. I was unhappy in a particular job and a mentor of mine told me to treat the job as if it was a new job that I loved and I got a promotion in less than two months.

I want to end this post with one more story about perception that happened back while I was working in a cell phone store. I was hanging out in the store with the owners for about an hour after closing time and a man came knocking on the door. Instead of turning the man away, we let him come in and we helped him out. We didn’t judge him and we treated him as if he was our best client and guess what? He became our best customer because of how we treated him. It would have been easy to tell him we were closed and that he should come back tomorrow but we didn’t see a dollar sign we saw a potential relationship. That’s what made our store succeed and have repeat customers because we wanted to establish a long term relationship with our clients.

Why try to see the world like everyone else when we are our own person? We are each different and the way we perceive things should reflect our individuality. So, don’t always go to with the flow, live life on your own terms.