What destroys possibilities

Monday, October 25, 2010.

Why possibilities aren't possible

As business coaches we begin our work with organizations and individuals by helping them create a vision.  For a team, it is a picture of the desired state of the business.  For an individual it is a picture of how a person will be, what they will be doing, and what they will have within a practical period of time.  It is an expression of results achieved; behaviors routinely demonstrated; relationships in place; and a life lived around what they truly aspire in relationship to their values.

Why is having a vision critical to growth and achievement and to living the life we want?  Does it work?  Here is what I have learned.

1)    You can be good at fixing problems as you go through life and still never get to where you want to be especially if where you want to go is unclear.  The context is missing for your actions.  Only a vision around what you want can give you the proper direction.

2)    Operating from long- held assessments, memories, and psychological stumbling blocks creates habits that keep you feeling a sense of hopelessness.  Operating from a vision can give you a sense of what is possible.  We need to grant ourselves that what we want is possible.  How we measured up to others or our own expectations in the past doesn't matter much.  These self- imposed or outside assessments were made in a different context at a different time.  Some were made by us as a child and they still hold us back.  What is a possibility is still a possibility.

3)    A well thought through, specific vision of that possibility creates clarity.  People can't do vague, fuzzy things. Whatever you see, believe, and act on, you can achieve.  I remember reading this quote in "Think and Grow Rich" by Napoleon Hill when I was 21 years old.  Every 21 year old should read it.  Heck, all of us should read it again.  Once the vision is clear, we can look at our current reality and actions/initiatives should become obvious.

Who knows how all this vision stuff works.  I know for sure in my life that when I had a clear vision of what I wanted for my life (family, spiritual, financial, physical, social, recreational, travel, business) and I set up a plan and acted on goals, my life took on a structure.  How I saw my life was framed in a story in my head and I acted it out with passion.  As I look back, most of what I envisioned happened.  Sometimes it took longer than I thought, but I eventually realized the possibility.  In the desk in my home office, I still have seven files.  One big vision and six connecting files with plans, goals and measurements.  But these measurements are not some psychological limitations set on me from the past.  They are about what is happening now and what's next.  Every year, on the beach in Mexico, I update those plans by updating the current reality and set new goals and actions I will take.  So, vision works.

One of the readings in "Think and Grow Rich" was a poem titled "I bargained with life for a Penny".  As I look back, I should have asked for more because the possibilities were invented and limited by me.  So, vision is the place to begin and is the place to act from in the present.  It is always amazing to me how easy it is for people to tell you their problems, their story from the past, yet stumble and mumble when trying to articulate where they are going in their business or life.  How come?  Don't they see what is possible?  Is it that they just don't think about it?  

A vision is a powerful framework to take the operations of any size from a lack luster or downward spiral into the arena of possibility.  If done right, a vision releases us from the weight and confusion of local problems and concerns and allows us to see the long clear line.  A vision answers to the market and it's people... what about me?  It doesn't fix anything.  It is just desired.  Speaking it, planning from it, begins the transformation of people.  Every time you do, the world becomes a universe of possibility and the barriers to the realization of the vision disappear.  Playing the business game from a vision is relevant to the manifestation of the possibility.  How else does someone play so well, so freely, so passionately?  So successfully?

ACTIONS

1.   I suggest there is nothing more important than getting a piece of paper and writing down (you can still do this without a computer, right?) what is the desired state of your business or department and/or your desired state of your life.  (family, business, spiritual, physical, recreational,  hobbies, social, financial).  Begin the transition by writing out the factual, (not your past opinionated story) about your current reality in relationship to what you want.  Then put in place goals, plans, initiatives, actions to get you there.  Now get six or so files going around connected mini visions/current realities that will guide your goals and actions.  I wouldn't let the weekend pass without doing this.   This is your ticket to a better business and better life.

2.While doing this, grant yourself this possible future.  Write, speak, plan as if you actually deserve it.

3.  Grant that you are a contribution to others.  Grant everyone else around you to be one as well.  We are not a hopeless cog in the wheel of business.

4.  Grant that you are a genuine player.  Someone who is not judging, watching or measuring how things are from the stands but someone on the court focusing on hitting the ball as it comes to you, in the moment, doing whatever it takes with whatever is being served to you.  (you can tell I am an old tennis player)  You can be a player or an observer.  It's your choice.

Incidentally I am leading a small group "Wake Up Your Business" coffee strategy huddle at my office on October 28^th from 8:00 a.m. - 9:45 a.m. at 2121 Argentia Road. It is filling so enroll now. It will be done in a workshop fashion, but we will have some dialogue. We will review the most important actions to take to prepare us for the rebound and to boost performance - now.  No cost.

To Enroll: Click Here