Whether you love or loathe him, crockpot nutjob Gordon Ramsay gets results. Chefs facing their demons in the ‘Kitchen Nightmares’ series regularly outrun their Achilles heel and with Ramsay leading the charge, turn their lives around.
The formula employed is singularly predictable. And it’s unbelievably easy to apply when you’re ready to revolutionise your life, with no help from the mouthy Scottish bulldog himself…
1. Evaluate your menu for life; is it appealing? Are you serving it up because you always have or is it to truly make you and your guests happy? Write down the ingredients of your life, to see what takes up your time and what’s most important to you.
2. Take stock of what’s going on behind the scenes. Are you happy as you could be? Are you running a tight ship or is your messy mind dictating how you live your life? It’s likely there are some issues you need to address. Are your emotions, the chefs of your mind, running amok and need retraining? Is budgeting a problem? Are you finding others are interfering with the running of your operation and you need to regain control of the situation?
It’s now you need to have a spring clean and get your house in order. You cant build a house on sand – make sure the foundations are solid before trying to move forward. Need to rid any old and fusty habits, beliefs and values and refurbish your life.
3. Write a journal of an average day. Jot EVERYTHING down – basic activities, interactions, any negative or positive thoughts that may dwell and cause you to act differently. Next, score everything you did; 0-10 according to the usefulness of each task. Anything on 5 or less needs taking off the menu; 6-7 – review for merit; 8-10 – question if anything can be improved here, and add your new-found time to give these tasks extra meaning in the future.
4. Go searching for new inspiration to bring you fresh fulfilment. We’re not talking milking the local cow or catching turtles here – though if that floats your boat it’s a valid idea – but depending on your chief passions, see what’s new out there and give yourself a treat.
5. Then it’s back to the all-new lemon-fresh kitchen of your mind to work up new recipes for your future happiness based on spending more time on the stuff that matters. Are you ready to treat your clients – personal and professional – to unprecedented and perfect plates of the new you?
6. Go out and ask people what they think of you. Be brave and bold and expect a bit of constructive criticism – you don’t win the equivalent of a Michelin star for personal performance by getting it right every time. The results will definitely amaze you, and providing you’re willing to act on suggestion you’re making the wisest move of this entire system. Commit to this task about two weeks after you gave yourself this fresh start, so you can ask for opinions on your attitude and behaviour before and after. Review and if necessary, modify your outlook based on comments.
7. Start setting daily goals. Check out my previous post on the relative merits of creating micro-targets. It’s a perfect time to set out on this journey to self-mastery and develop unequalled levels of performance.
To truly succeed you have to work on your core strengths and deliver beyond expectation every time. We’re not just talking career here – going the extra mile works even better when you’re spending time with your friends and family.