30 Day Challenge: Expand Your Possibilities

Today marks the beginning of my 30-Day challenge to expand your idea of what's possible. Here's how it goes: for the next month, notice your thoughts around what you'd like to have in your life and what you believe is possible. For example, you want a lifestyle that allows you more free time and you want to work a maximum of 25 hours a week with no reduction in income. Where before you might have jumped to "how can I do that" then "I don't know how I can do that so it must not be possible for me" this time, you are going to work with your thoughts and nudge them toward leaving the possibility out there, as in "I can't see the how right now, but I acknowledge that there might be a possibility that will emerge." That's all I'm asking. Just to allow for the possibility, then report back on what happens. 

I'm about to go on vacation, so I'll touch base when upon return and let you know what showed up the first week of really practicing this thought. Blessings - Teri

Relationships Make It All Happen

I was working with a client today, a young woman entering the early stages of entrepreneurism and wanting so much to create a successful launch all at once. I walked with her in the conversation to the point where she realized that every part of her success hinges upon her ability to build solid relationships with people. The impact this realization made on her was palpable on the call. Suddenly, she saw her business in the larger context of her life, and service to others and the dots came together to form a picture that really touched her.

We talked about how everything we experience—certainly all our business success—happens through the relationships we have with others. Therefore, relationship building must be a part of every business person's skill set. And in a broader context, she saw this as an opportunity to live her spiritual values: to offer love to her fellow men and women, to show up authentically and be interested in them and what is going on in their world. I think she's well on her way to great success, and it was an excellent reminder to me.

Leading Change

After participating in Bill Welter's webinar today, (he is the author of The Prepared Mind of a Leader: Eight Skills Leaders Use to Innovate, Make Decisions and Solve Problems) I was pondering the whole concept of responding to change in our businesses and our personal lives. In light of the number of changes unfolding on multiple fronts daily, the question arises, "What's relevant to me?" 

I believe we must become even better at knowing our values and priorities in order to allow in those ideas and possibilities that are most relevant and screen out the ones that have low relevancy. How do we accomplish this? It will likely look different for each of us, but on some level we must integrate our values and vision for the future into our everyday mind. 

For those of us who journal, we can note what is holding our attention. What are the topics you return to repeatedly? If you have regular reading either online or in the newspaper or trade journals, what sections do you turn to religiously? What personal interest stories grab you? And how do these interests relate to your top values?

Perhaps we begin by simply asking a few key questions:

• How and why is this change relevant to me? 
• How might it represent opportunity?
• What can I do to understand the meaning behind the change and how it relates to my business?
• What responses are called for, if any?

Bill used the example of Folgers Coffee leading the market for several decades, and not paying attention to the upstart Starbucks when it was making ripples in Seattle. If Folgers had responded  early in the game, the outcome might have been very different in coffee land. What is happening in your business sector now that might represent a huge opportunity? 

And the larger question may be, are we taking time to think about what's happening and reflect on what that might mean? Or are we so much in reacting mode that this kind of strategic thought doesn't happen?