I love my work.
There’s little success in the life of a person who doesn’t.
None of us know how much sand is left in the top of our glass timer and I can’t think of anything worse than spending time, the only thing we inexorably spend and cannot earn, in unfulfilling work that doesn’t interest or excite you.
But even if you do enjoy your work, as I did for the majority of my nineteen years in corporate sales, if it’s not your calling, if it’s not in harmony with a bigger, personal, private purpose for you, there’s a significant piece of the “success jigsaw” missing.
If I get my way, I’ll depart this life all spent, utterly burned out yet comforted by a legacy, having made a difference and sown seeds of value in the lives of others.
I couldn’t care less if I get credit for the difference. Don’t misunderstand me, most of us would like to leave people and the world a better place for having passed through it, but it’s the difference, not the channel by which it was birthed, that matters.
That’s the output of a life well spent.
During my days at the John Maxwell Team events, one act of facilitation for me is a “Think Tank” – a deliberately structured “workshop” absent of content, other than what active participants choose to bring.
These are my favourite “gigs” of all. The only coaching, teaching and/or mentoring is drawn from the questions and/or topics participants bring.
It’s built on exactly the same learning principles as my Entrepreneurial Mastery Inner Circle – an environment that drives participants to THINK into their results, to be intentional about the outcomes they intend to draw from the exchange, to be conscious in the activity of shaping the conditions and circumstances of their lives.
Hence the term “Think Tank”.
You can’t put a price on relevance.
It makes the entire interaction real.
Situational.
Invaluable.
Einstein allegedly said: “The only source of knowledge is experience”. I understand his point, but his comment leaves us short changed.
The only source of knowledge is an evaluated experience. Actually, it’s the only source of wisdom. Knowledge isn’t the source of power, wisdom is, and wisdom is knowledge “made flesh” through an evaluated experience.
If experience alone was our greatest teacher, and the only source of knowledge, we wouldn’t continue to do the things that clearly no longer serve our greater good.
The kind of intervention at an “Entrepreneurial Think Tank” is not only incredibly valuable, it’s incredibly rare.
It takes a very different level of skill to carry this kind of “gig” off. You’ve got to have the knowledge, experience, skill set, awareness and the psychological dexterity that comes from it to know which “hat” to wear, in order to serve the individual concerned to the best of your ability.
With all due respect to the practitioners who do it (of which I am one at times), it’s not hard to dump a load of information or theory on people.
Beyond the ability to communicate effectively, anyone can train, teach and “chalk and talk” but to coach, mentor, teach and speak into a myriad of different conditions and circumstances coming from the lives of individuals with unique needs, perspectives, challenges and aspirations takes an entirely different level of facilitation.
And you’ve got to be exceptionally comfortable in your own skin.
Everyone gets fed in a “Think Tank”. It’s not just those who ask questions who benefit. Light bulbs illuminate above the heads of everyone present. There’s a wealth of knowledge and awareness to be gained from observing the question and the interaction preceeding it – especially when the facilitator ensures the necessary reflection takes place. That’s how experience gets evaluated.
As a wise observer once said: “when one teaches, two learn”.
Or in this case, many.
Success is, unquestionably, a personal outcome. It means different things to different people. We all have different businesses, different values, different aspirations and different dreams, but what stops us achieving the unique outcomes we desire for our lives, regardless of what level we’re at, is universe to us all.
As Emerson observed: “Of what use to make heroic vows of amendment, if the same old lawbreaker is to keep them”.
You’re not alone in the challenge. It just feels that way for a lot of the time.
Christian Simpson is the UK’s leading coach and mentor to business owners and entrepreneurs. For COMPLIMENTARY ACCESS to tried, tested and proven entrepreneurial success strategies, click here
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