Choices
A friend and client (James) suggested I write an article today on the back of our conversation, and that’s the simple / real reason why I’m sitting here at 11am on a Friday on the laptop and writing this.
The other reason is to help focus my mind on how I can help more people be they friends, clients or people I’ve not yet met, and on top of that if that leads to one more person crossing the line to becoming a successful entrepreneur or a new friend all the better.
I wondered what to write about and the big loud intuitive and logical answer was “Choices”.
Many people I’ve known and dealt with and myself more than once often say and think “I have to … “, “I need to…” “I should… “.
The good news, these points of view and usually based on what feels like fact and logic.
The bad news is that the logic is flawed, distorted and put bluntly “wrong”.
People generally don’t have materially complete information, not about themselves and what they are capable of, nor about the people they know, or the businesses they work/own, nor the market opportunities, nor the human potential – both ontological, physiological, nor in human communications and understandings, nor technological innovations/research and development, nor the random environmental factors and macro factors, … and so on.
Yet they make statements and judgements and don’t inquire into what’s possible.
Many have a very fixed point of view and anything that even questions this causes them to be defensive.
No in some areas of life this could be said to make sense and be understandable. In other areas however it is fairly clear to see that this isn’t a useful way to be in the world, in business or in relationships.
Lets take an example of someone trying to leave a room by what seems like the obvious door and they are pulling and pulling on the handle but to no avail. They are adamant this is the way out and they have to leave right now. Maybe they event try to knock or kick the door down, trying harder and harder to get through what for them is becoming “an obstacle”.
Now imagine if someone says, “Hi – I can help.. can you stop and listen for a minute?”.
The person trying to leave in most cases when confronted by a stranger saying something like that won’t stop for a moment, may be polite or rude and in the worst cases may start to hate the interruption and get more and more frustrated.
Imagine if that stranger having tried repeatedly to help by asking goes to the next step and actually places a hand on him to try and slow him down.
If this was “Eastenders” or your local TV soap opera a fight might even break out…
It’s unlikely that the person trying to help would go “great” at this point..
Now what if that door was double locked and blocked from the outside, would your perspectives of what is happening change?
What if more than that the door he was so sure was the exit was blocked because there was real danger on the other side and even opening the door would cause permanent irreparable damage to the man trying to leave (and even other people)?
What if there was another door just to the side that was wide open and already waiting on the other side was everything that man had ever dreamed of?
Now, you may be thinking this is fanciful but all too often this is the reality I’ve seen happening in businesses and for people.
They have all this potential and they (and me at times) can get fixated in how things have to be to get the result we want. We can take what happens and end up in a destructive or stagnant logic loop. In this case, like the classic fly knocking its head on the window pane, no matter how hard it flies it will never get through. Well logically never but what if…
In my view, if you’re reading this, then you are in a wonderful lucky position. Many people don’t have the luxury to invest their time in activities like this, which is yes as simple as reading an article, but can also be a subtle and powerful transformation experience which can result in truly revolutionary results. That is a big statement and one that over the last two decades I’ve learnt to understand and know to be true, not just think or believe to be.
Most people don’t have the ears to here or the eyes to see what is happening or being offered.
I too make errors in judgement and all we can do is do our best and trust our instincts (while knowing that they too may not be 100% accurate).
This willingness to be open to anything being possible (which it clearly has to be by definition), and making choices about what to say, do or not say and not do is in my view one of the most valuable and rarest skills.
The difference or distinction between a choice and decision is very clear once you can see it. Until then they may occur as the same thing.
The business client we’re mentoring who says, “I can’t go to X, because I can’t see how to afford it” is not making a choice. They are operating from decision and often from a mindset of scarcity.
This doesn’t mean to become delusional or irresponsible, far from it, it’s about getting really clear and present to what is so and the facts so that you can make an informed choice.
Are you willing to enquire in the facts and having done that make an informed choice?
We’ll see…
In business you get to choose whom you have as customers, what we call your Customer Avatars™ but most people don’t think that way.
Most people want to make sales today, but forget that business and life doesn’t happen in an instant and that the results they produce today in every area of their life are the results and products of previous choices, decisions, conversations and actions that they have taken (and others have taken) over previous days, weeks, months, years, decades and centuries and beyond.
I have more than once produced results that for my friends and clients they felt were magical or impossible. Well clearly they were not impossible as the results happened. They allowed me the privilege to help and point them at a door they may not have seen or believed was shut or not going to take them where they really wanted to get.
What you call that role I play I don’t know but they call it awesome and priceless.
It’s what I do and I love when people start getting present to how many choices they really have and start living from that place.
So I think now is a good place and time to leave for now and leave you with a couple of quotes from one of my inspirations and a question.
We always overestimate the change that will occur in the next two years and underestimate the change that will occur in the next ten. Don’t let yourself be lulled into inaction – Bill Gates
People massively overestimate what they can do in a day, and massively underestimate what they can do in a decade. – Jim Rohn
Final Question:
“What if the only limit is the one you set yourself?”
Thanks for reading,
What comes next.. well that’s your choice.. isn’t it?
Simon Hedley FCA
Strategic Alchemist™
www.SimonHedley.com
Co-Founder LimitLessNOW™
www.LimitLessNOW.com
Useful Resources:
Read: www.TheSuccessSpiral.com
Want to Get help with your business / venture and start to explore what might be possible for you,
then review and complete: www.VSOstrategist.com/step1
Ideas Intelligently Implemented:
NB:
If you’ve found this useful, please let me know what you liked and what you’ve done or will do as a result.
If you want to share it you can just please keep the article complete in it’s totality and feel free to link to this post.
