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Those of us in the Northern Hemisphere stand on the threshold of that Solstice moment.Will you mark it as your turning point? Your defining moment? The moment when you say “yes” to the full expression of your life? Are you ready to embrace a new standard for your career; for your business and your finances; for your relationships and your health and wellness? Are you ready to step up your game? Are you ready to commit to a life that is extraordinary? That leaves a legacy for generations?Or will you let it slide by lost in the holiday noise?We can make our lives soaring symphonies… or not.We get to choose.It is the turning point. Will it be yours?_____________________________________________________________________A Solstice invitation: Join a community of like-minded people who want more. Coaching, mentorship, resources to take you the distance. The Summit Mastermind. Check it out HERE!Go Sit On The Stairs
That’s what we used to say to our kids when they were acting out. “You, go sit on the stairs and think about how you should behave.” It was our form of “time out.”
We all need some form of time out. Especially at this time of the year.
I’m just back from a time out. It was astoundingly restorative.
A colleague of mine invited me to join him as his guest for two days with his mastermind group, a small, elite collection of entrepreneurs and business professionals. Two days off the grid, away from emails and phone calls and text messages and alerts. Two days of real focus. Two days of brainstorming, troubleshooting, and collaborating. Two days generating powerful new ways of working in the world.
I railed against the invitation at first. I had so much on my plate. Appointments and conferences. Clients and a community to serve. A website nearly done. A launch I care about deeply. I couldn’t “afford” to take the time, I told myself.
Then I grabbed hold of my bad self. What would I tell you?
I’d tell you that working on your business is every bit as important as working in your business, if not more so. That stepping back from your work on a regular basis allows you to bring perspective to it; and enables you to come back to it renewed and revitalized. That nurturing yourself, allowing yourself some space, gives you the opportunity to re-charge and then return to serve in the world in a much more powerful and effective way.
I’d tell you that by stepping out of the fray and surrounding yourself with like-minded entrepreneurs and business professionals who want for you, who have your back, who cheer for your success re-invigorates you; that by tapping into the resources of a collective intelligence and wisdom is the most creative, visionary and dynamic way to take your own work to a whole new level.
I’d tell you that there is no better way to enter a New Year, no better way to honor yourself and the work you do, no better way to become more resourceful for the people you are meant to serve, than to take the time – the dedicated time – to rest, renew and re-create yourself; and from that place design with care and intent what the road ahead will be for you and for those you care for. 
I had gotten myself into a bad state: Frustrated by projects and caught in the weeds. I told my bad self: “You, go sit on the stairs. Think about how you want to behave!”
Two days. Energy, vision, creativity, resilience restored.
This can be such a manic time of year. A New Year awaits you. Your clients, your customers, and those you love need you. Your very best you.
Take a time out.
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We’ve doing a free webinar training next week: How To Make 2017 Your Best Year Ever Without Stress or Overwhelm and Without Losing Focus and Momentum. It’s a great opportunity to take the time to mindfully create what you most want in the year ahead. Please join us. Go HERE to register and reserve your spot.
The Vortex Is Here
It’s December. And we’re being pulled into the vortex of time. The maelstrom is all around us! Can you feel it?
Perhaps it’s just me. But after Halloween, the year just seems to accelerate. After Thanksgiving, the days move forward at warp speed. The commitments and the demands and the lists and the expectations and the projects that need to be done – have to get done – before the end of the year seem to mount logarithmically. And then there are the card lists and the gift lists and the shopping and the holiday parties… .
It’s enough to make one want to jump ship… .
What to do?
Wrong question.
The question is what not to do.
The way out of the vortex – the only way – is the simplest and the hardest thing of all (at least it is for me). The only way out is to say “no.”
Saying “no” is not news and it’s not rocket science. All of the leadership and success books tell us that it is fundamental to our sanity and, paradoxically, a key to achieving our goals.
There is an article in Success Magazine entitled Actively Do Nothing. “People could improve their mental and physical health as well as their relationships by carving out a portion of their day to do nothing,” the article states.
Jack Canfield in his book The Success Principals recommends creating a “stop-doing”or “don’t do” list.
Ann and I met a woman at the gym a few months ago. We invited her to one of our Denali slide show presentations. Her response: “Thank you. But I ‘don’t do’ evening commitments.” We were really impressed by that.
So why is saying “no” so hard? Certainly, we’re conditioned from very early on that “no” is not the right answer. As time goes on, we also begin to layer on our own assumptions – whether true or not – about what others expect of us. Sometimes, I suspect, saying “yes” is just a habit. (I said yes to a commitment recently without even stopping to realize I would be out of the country during the time I had committed!) And for me, there is a healthy dose of narcissistic self-importance that loves to believe that somehow my presence is essential or that I am the only one who can do something.
So as the vortex swirls, I’m working on saying “no” more often.
I’ve started by asking myself whether a project or an invitation is one that I “should” do or accept rather than one I “want” to do or accept. I’m working at eliminating the “shoulds.”
Saying no to the non-essential allows us to be more fully present to what is most important. By doing less, we can pay closer attention to what is essential. And as The Little Prince reminds us, “what is essential is invisible to the eye.” It takes time to see.
The Carmelite monk William McNamara writes,
“We are not really practical, and we shall get nowhere, we shall never find life, life will escape us, unless we learn not to always be bustling about – unless we learn to be still, to let things happen around us, to wait, listen, receive, contemplate.”
“One final word on the subject of time,” McNamara says: 
“I suggest that we stop doing half the work that presently consumes us. Then let us attend to the remaining half wholeheartedly, with contemplative vision and creative love. I stake the authenticity of our lives and the effectiveness of our work on this radical shift.”
I described the vortex to a friend today as a giant flushing toilet bowl.
Not a great place to end up.
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Go HERE for 7 simple practices that will make life a whole lot saner.
Maybe You Need A Good Excuse
Excuses are good; really good. Because, if you’ve got a plausible excuse, then you’re safe… you don’t need to do anything; you don’t need to risk anything.
If you want to do, be or have something more for yourself; if you’d like your life to be different; if you’d like your health to be better; or if you’d like a job that makes you happy; or a relationship that makes your heart soar; and you’ve got an excuse… well, then, nothing really is required of you. 
You can just sit tight. Stay comfy. And let the clock run out.
Or not.
The Biggies
Here are the excuses I hear most frequently from clients:
- It’s not the right time. “I’m too old, too young, too fat, too out of shape. I need to save up some more money; I need to wait for the promotion or partnership or bonus; I need to wait until the kids are out of school; I need to wait until my partner retires or I retire; or… .”
The truth is: It’s NEVER the right time. There are ALWAYS obstacles. There are ALWAYS hurdles to jump; there are ALWAYS challenges to overcome.
Now is the only time you have. Tomorrow is promised to do one. Goethe says, “What you can do, or dream you can do, begin it; Boldness has genius, power and magic in it.”
- I could never do that. I’m not brave enough; fast enough; strong enough; fit enough; smart enough; wealthy enough; creative enough; ___________ enough.
I could never do that. I’m not enough.
It’s one of our core insecurities as human beings: That I’m not enough.
It’s why we strive. It’s why we have the Sistine Chapel and rocket ships and the computer and smartphones… because we achieve, we strive… because we forever strive… for more. But the worry that we’re not enough also stops us short; holds us back.
But we’re already enough. All we need is within us already.
Everyone starts from the same place. A Mozart, a Picasso, a Marconi; and some even start from hugely disadvantaged places: a Lincoln, a Mandela, an Oprah.
No matter where you start, you have enough – you are enough – to go the distance.
- It will take too long. It will take 4 years for the degree; 7 years for the residency; 6 months to train for the race; a year to lose the weight; 3 to write the book; and who knows how long to find the ‘right one.’
So what? Who cares? The clock is ticking. The time will pass; whether you take the next step; or not.
It may well take you three years to launch your new business; but the three years will come and go even if you never launch.
Greatness takes time. The overnight success has spent many a sleepless overnight. And while maybe you won’t need 10,000 hours to sharpen your skills, you still need to put in the effort.
Opportunity often disguises itself as work; and work worth doing – legacy work, generational work, world-changing work – often takes a long time.
- It’s too big; too hard. It’s complicated, confusing, overwhelming, I can’t figure it out. I don’t know where to research it; I don’t know who to talk to; I don’t know what to do next.
Even highly successful, highly accomplished professionals labor with this excuse. The more expert we become in a particular area, the more daunting it is to venture into a new one. We like the familiarity of our own turf.
And even highly successful folks have ‘blind spots.’ They may excel in the business life and struggle in their relationships; their finances might be stellar and their health in the toilet.
Too, we live in a culture of overwhelm. There’s so much flying at us all the time. We suffer from information overload. We resist wanting to take in more.
But what we need to remember is that every journey starts with a single step. Every ultra I’ve run, every mountain I’ve climbed… no matter how long or how big gets finished by taking one step… and then the next.
We want to see the entire way. But we don’t need to. “Take the first step in faith,” Martin Luther King, Jr. said. “You don’t need to see the whole staircase; just take the first step.”
In every endeavor, every business venture, every fitness goal, every financial objective, every marketing campaign, every piece of research, it’s just one step at a time.
And the hardest one is the first one. So just take it!
- It’s too risky. I don’t want to fail; I don’t want to lose my job; I don’t want to lose money; I don’t want to get hurt in another relationship; I don’t want to get injured. It’s too dangerous.
This is the most pernicious excuse of all because it seems to make so much sense. Why take unnecessary risks… why put yourself in harm’s way?
Guess what? Life is dangerous. None of us gets out alive.
I have a buddy who has been on Mt. Everest twice; summitted once. He shattered his leg cleaning out the leaves from the gutters on his one-story house.
We like to believe in stability; in constancy. But the only thing that is constant, the only sure thing is that things will change.
Businesses collapse, partnerships fail, marriages come unraveled, layoffs happen, people get sick, markets crash. And as much as we like to maintain an illusion of control, we really don’t have very much at all.
Our comfort zones are called comfort zones because, well, they’re pretty damn comfy. But what’s true is that the magic happens just beyond. Our greatest breakthroughs… our very best lives… are just outside that place of comfort. Life rewards those who risk.
What’s Next?
So excuses are good; in fact, they’re great… if you want to stay stuck. Not so much if you want a big life. The stories we tell ourselves are just that: stories. It’s as easy to make up a small story as it is a grand one.
Grand is better.
What are your favorite go-to excuses? And what will you do now?
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When you’re ready to bust through, let’s connect. Email me: [email protected]
Why Expectations Don’t Work
He was so frustrated. “She should have known that I needed her here at noon.”
My client, a very successful attorney, was baffled by the fact her paralegal hadn’t shown up with the file she’d been sent out to get from another lawyer’s office.
“Did she agree to be here by noon?” I asked.
“What do you mean? She knows how important this case is.”
The classic trap that business leaders and professionals fall into.
You can manage by expectation. Or you can manage by agreement.
Agreement is better.
If my client had sent her para out on this mission, told her that he needed the file by noon, and then said, “So, can we agree that you’ll get it back here by noon?” then the paralegal’s lack of timeliness is on her. But there was no such conversation. My client’s exasperation was based purely on my client’s expectation of what someone else “should” know. 
(The para had stopped for lunch. She had no clue.)
We make this error often in our personal lives too.
If I come home after a long day at an event, and go straight to my office to return calls without stopping to connect with my wife, and she seethes because I should have stopped to have a conversation, that’s on her.
If, instead, she says, “Honey, you know, when you come in at the end of a day, I would so love to connect with you before you start returning your calls. Would that be ok? Could we agree to that?” and I do, then the next time I blow by forgetting about her is on me. I didn’t live up to the agreement.
People – paralegals, partners, teenagers – aren’t mind readers.
Expectations are the stories we create ourselves. And they’re unreliable.
Use agreements instead.
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When you’re ready to change up your leadership game, let’s talk. Email me: [email protected]
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