“I’m not sure if I have any reason to care if my blades are sharp or dull!” I know she wished she had never said those words to me.
In Texas, when we say: “Bless her heart …” we really mean: “I’m getting ready to rock her world!” And I hope I did!
“What about your kids? They need your blades to be sharp, and going in the right direction! And what about your husband? He deserves your very best, and he needs your support on his new venture? And what about YOU? You have sacrificed so much to make sure everyone else was taken care of! And YOU DESERVE to thrive, to be fulfilled! Because YOUR BEST DAYS are just ahead!”
It’s the kind of thing I say often to people. For some, they don’t think they deserve more. For some, they don’t even know there’s more. For some, they think they are too old, too young. Or they’ve made too many mistakes, or they haven’t earned it.
If I could sit with you today, whether you are reading this at your desk, in line at Target, sitting at your kitchen table, or waiting in a doctor’s office … I’d lean in and say to you: “Everyone deserves more fulfillment, more hope, more ability to help people you care about, and more hope that their best days are just ahead.”
Although what I’m sharing is the foundation of Coaching 101, it’s not just people who would like to hang out a shingle and Coach people (or relationships, or businesses) to greatness that need this! WE ALL NEED IT!
Last week, I shared the story of the four blades on a propeller, and how that we are either spiraling upward and onward to greater things, are downward and nosediving toward a destiny we would not have other wise chosen.
These are the basics of Life Coaching. The truth is, as I inform my Coaches in training, “If this is all you take into a Coaching practice, you can address almost anything with your clients”. Of course in the ensuing months, I teach many tools, concepts, and interventions. But all of those, without these basics, are fairly ineffective.
You can use these concepts yourself, whether or not you become a Coach. You can use them with yourself, with those you love.
Why am I sharing this? Because I am teaching you the basics to take your life to the next level. And to help those you love to get to the next level as well. My hope and prayer is that you will take this info and use it in your own personal life first, but then pass it on to others.
After all, this is what Coaching is about. Helping people become their very best, and taking their lives to levels they never dreamed possible.
Can you imagine what the world would look like if we ALL did that? For ourselves first, then with others? It’s the very reason I use the term “World Changer“ so often. Because if we all did this, imagine the impact it could and would have on the world. If we all employed these concepts, and then passed them on, the impact would be massive and transformational.
You joining this mission makes a major difference. Let’s get started!
As I said last week, if you intervene powerfully in any of the four blades, you can reverse the direction of your life (if it’s in downward or nosedive momentum). In addition, if you are spiraling in an upward and onward direction, you can greatly enhance the speed and the quality of taking your life upward and onward to the next level.
Let’s review what the four blades on the propeller of your life are:
1. Understanding Our Potential.
2. Responding with Emotional Mastery
3. Making Quality Decisions, Based on Our Needs
4. Evaluating What We Believe
Whether your life is tanking, or whether you are at an all time high, you can intervene in any or all of the blades to see significant turnaround and breakthrough, regardless of what place you are starting from.
I have done this, and keep momentum going by continually working on and sharpening my blades, to insure my fulfillment, success, healthy, energy, vibrancy, hope and determination. I do it in my office daily with my clients, and get to see progress that many counselors believe could take years. I train Coaches to do this to contribute my part to impacting our world.
Let’s look at how you can intervene on any of the four blades in your life. It does not matter where you start. Just get started! I will share the first one this week, and the others in the next couple of weeks.
1. POTENTIAL
Intervening on our potential does not change our potential. What it does is that it causes us to see our potential accurately, embrace it, and advance it forward!
Research tells us that there are six distinct qualities and abilities present in those who are exercising great levels of their potential.
One of the ways you can either turn this blade around, or sharpen it, is to work at developing any and/or all of these qualities in your life.
Let’s look at each of them:
- Resiliency
Resiliency is not always the ability to keep yourself from being challenged, knocked off balance, or even prevent yourself from falling. The definition is the ability to recover quickly from extreme difficulties. It is when a person can process and adapt to the world even in the face of trauma, diversity, or distress.
Here’s how you can work to develop more resiliency. Write out your “plan of action” for when you face difficulties. Keep it handy at all times. Determine that you will access your plan the next time you face a difficulty and follow it, whether you feel like it or not.
When I first developed my plan, cell phones were not yet “smart” … so I printed my little plan on labels and put the labels on the back of about 10 of my business cards. I kept one in my car, one in my purse, one in my office desk, one in my home desk, and various other places. My plan was simple, but a HUGE improvement on where I was in resiliency at the time.
1. Pause and practice 3 minutes of gratitude.
2. Read this statement out loud with confidence at least 10 times: “I have faced difficult challenges before, and I survived. I can figure this out, with the help of God, friends and family. This too shall pass!”
3. Call one of my classmates (from graduate school) to process what just happened.
4. Write out three possible solutions.
5. Unless it’s a 9-1-1 life or death emergency, take three hours to consider options before taking action.
Although my plan advanced through the years, I still have a couple of tattered business cards with the “plan” on them.
What will your plan be?
- Excellence
People who embrace and desire to grow their potential do everything from a place of excellence. They would never consider doing just enough to get by. They are in continuous mode to improve in all they do, all they say, and in all of their choices and decisions.
This in no way implies that they never do things half heartedly, or even drop the ball totally. It means that as soon as they become aware of this, they re-enter the race, striving for excellence.
Always remember, excellence is not a destination, it is a journey. In addition, do not confuse excellence with perfection. Perfection paralyzes us, excellence challenges us to do/be better.
Like me, you might wonder how to intervene on this blade. I remember when the excellence concept appeared in my life. I understood how critical it was if I wanted to fulfill my dreams. But I didn’t have a clue how to begin working on sharpening that blade.
I asked one of my mentors how to begin to address it. I didn’t like the answer, but it is actually the very thing that helped me turn that blade around and sharpen it like a razor!
My mentor asked me: “Do you have any daily chores at home?“ I grumbled, “Yes, and I hate them!“ He asked me which one I hated the most? I responded, “Having to sweep up all of the hair on the bathroom floor every morning.“ He asked me how I performed the chore when I was within eyesight of either of my parents. I told him I did it perfectly and spotlessly. And I was quite proud of my answer, because it was honest.
The second question didn’t bring me quite so much joy. He asked me, “How do you do the job if neither of your parents are watching?“
I ducked my head and practically whispered, “Well I get the obvious parts up.“ He wouldn’t just accept that response. He just had to pry a little more: “And what do you do with the rest of it?“ With great shame, and I could feel the redness traveling from my neck up to my cheeks, as I shamefully responded, “I fan the floor just a little bit with the broom so it goes under cabinet where you can’t see it.“
I would have rather crawled in a hole than answer that question. Yes, it was a great lesson. He said, the greatest place to tweak and activate excellence in your life, is to make note of how you handle responsibilities when no one is watching.
Ouch!
But I can tell you … that one thing has brought great excellence to my life, and it increased my ability to embrace and grow my potential regularly, and tremendously!
How do you handle responsibilities and actions when no one is watching? That’s the true test of your excellence. Begin operating from excellence when no one but you will know! It’s a remarkable blade sharpener!
- High Risk Tolerance
UGH! Risk tolerance? Really? YES, really! What is it?
Risk tolerance is the ability to be out of your comfort zone. However, for me, it was more like stepping into terror then developing risk tolerance.
You can begin to develop your risk tolerance by doing things slightly outside your comfort zone, until that becomes comfortable, then taking a step further out from what’s comfortable.
At the time I began developing my risk tolerance, I was also learning about the benefits of giving, and practicing generosity.
I had been told that giving first, instead of giving from what I had left over brought greater blessing and reward. At the time I was working at my first “real job“ which was at our local movie theater. Every week on Friday, we got paid cash in a “pay day” envelope.
I had heard the concept about giving 10%, and I tried to do that if I had enough left over. I wasn’t quite risk tolerant enough to put my 10% in a separate envelope on Friday afternoon. But I decided I would start with what ever change was in my pay envelope. Honestly, I hoped every Friday it was like a nickel, and not $.98.
After awhile, I became quite comfortable with pouring my change out, and putting it into my giving envelope. (Yes, I was using the envelope system while Dave Ramsey was still broke, and long before he developed the envelope system. Hey, maybe he stole it from me!)
I did that until I was comfortable, then I begin putting a one dollar bill and the change into my giving envelope. When I became comfortable with that, I began putting all 10% in a separate envelope the moment I got paid.
A few years later I was challenged to increase my giving to 20%. Oh my word! That was a stretch. But I practiced the same concept. Until I was able to immediately set aside 20%.
This is not about telling you how much to give or when to give it. It’s about how to begin establishing risk tolerance in your life.
Choose an arena of your life to start in. Then take a small step outside your comfort zone until you’re comfortable there, then another small step outside of that, until you’re comfortable there. That’s how you develop risk tolerance in any area of your life.
Although I’m always switching what area in my life that I am stretching my risk tolerance on, I always have an area in progress. Because I am fully aware of how it increases my ability to embrace my potential, and sharpen the blade!
What about you? Where will you start?
- Competitiveness
People who embrace their potential have a real competitive edge. However, they do not normally compete with others as much as they compete with themselves.
Choose an area and compete with yourself. Increase the minutes you exercise, challenge yourself to read a bit more than you normally do, etc. I keep a “success card” in the back of my daily book in order to keep competing with myself. Where it’s improving my BMI, the amount of money I am saving, or communicating more regularly with those I love, I always want to be superseding what was once “my best” in various areas of my life.
What about you? What area will you start with in competing with yourself? Something that will make you better, call you to higher places, and set a great example?
Having a competitive edge keeps us out of the zone of “settling!” Stop “settling”!
- Thrive in Uncertainty
Because certainty was my number one need when I began my quest to thrive in uncertainty, I thought it was an impossible feat. You may feel the same way.
This one was quite painful for me, so I asked my mentor at the time to help me because it seemed impossible from where I was.
Her tip to me might be helpful to you in your quest. She suggested that rather than fighting uncertainty, that I take situations where there was uncertainty and to begin to create some certainty. She explained that it might not remove all uncertainty, but it would definitely reduce my fear (more like terror) and pain (more like excruciating pain).
At the time I was in graduate school, and I was quite set on maintaining my 4.0 GPA. That kept my uncertainty at an all time high. But we used it as a way to help me begin to create some certainty in the face of uncertainty.
Here’s what I did to create some certainty:
Established study times and habits that removed some uncertainty
Asked for extra credit opportunities
Worked harder on papers and projects where I had more control over the end result
I felt so pleased with creating some certainty in my uncertainty, that it almost became a “game“ for me anytime I faced uncertainty. Over the next year the results were interesting. Certainty was no longer my number one need, and I actually learned to enjoy the game.
Perhaps you could benefit in honing the scale by finding some ways to increase certainty rather than trying to fight off uncertainty. What area will you chose, and what will you do to initiate some certainty in that situation?
- Curiosity
One of the things that I love most about observing children is their “awe“ and “wonder“ about the world. They are not afraid to ask questions when they are in their awe and wonder.
Why is the ocean sometimes blue, and sometimes turquoise?
How do birds fly?
How does Santa Claus visit every child in the world on one night?
One of the things I teach couples about their marriages and relationships, (and ambitious people about their businesses) is this: “When you face challenges, if you will become curious, you will be much more resourceful!”
I encourage couples to play the “what if“ game when they are in the midst of a challenge.
“What if we were on a cruise right now? Would this argument about how to install this battery in our security camera really matter?”
“What if we had just won the lottery? Would we be having this fight about how much these tennis shoes cost”?
“What if‘s” create curiosity.
I teach business owners the same thing to get them out of the forest so they can see the trees in business.
“If I was Warren Buffett, how would I handle this situation?”
“If I had all the wisdom of Solomon, what would I do?”
People who are sharpening their potential use curiosity to extend their territory and enlarge their borders.
What could you begin to be curious about? Rather than overwhelmed? Rather than expecting the worst? Rather than spewing out negativity?
Begin practicing curiosity!
I would like to challenge you this week to begin working on sharpening at least two of the six qualities and characteristics that people who embrace their potential possess.
Likely, you already have some of those mastered. Do not settle there. Choose others that you could improve upon. That alone will propel your upward and onward to greater things. To become the best version of you, and accomplish all you can do to make your world, and the world a better place.
Then pass it on by helping others. If it was the only contribution you made to the world, it would be a significant one. You are here for a purpose, and shining the light on the path for someone else (after you put the face mask with oxygen on yourself first), you will find yourself more fulfilled than you ever dreamed!
I believe in you and I hope you will get started today!
