Flying Solo

This year has been a banner year for me as far as decisions go. I mean real decisions. The ones that stick. That's because I made some real hard ones when noone one else was around. It wasn't anyone else's idea that I was jumping on a bandwagon for. Some of them have been profound enough in their ramifications that the results were very noticeable and others have just led me down a better path with no outward manifestations. It's all about decisions. Like my friend Troy Brown says, "It's in your moments of decision that your life is shaped."

I've been in a lot of group environments in my life. Lots of church revivals, special women's events, business seminars. Most of them move me to make decisions and at some of those events I've made some very significant decisions. Where I make the ones that REALLY matter, though, is when I'm staring at the ceiling as I'm waking up in the morning. There are so many voices that speak to us to be less than we can be - and listening to those voices causes us to live up to their prophecies over us. But to catapult up past all those limiting thoughts and choose to live on a higher plane where the voices can't be heard as loudly, is a solo flight. Noone can make that choice for you. If you choose to be all you can be, you might make some people feel uncomfortable - because you don't match their perception of you anymore and that's hard for them. Can you feel that heat and not snap back to the "normal?" It's a solo flight.

You Can't Get There The Way You Are

One of my mentors said this in so many words when addressing a group of us at a business gathering and so lest you think he said it to me personally - as much as it would have been ok, he said it to a group! :)

What do I aspire to? AND can I get there being who I am? Or is some very valuable tweaking a good idea? This isn't about "being yourself," but it IS all about being the best "you" you can be, and that involves never-ending change and growth.

I marvel at some observations since I'm an avid people watcher. Here they are.

The people who I notice, who really stand out in the crowd and are the people I want to be around are the "readers." They actually read books, ON PURPOSE, and they're not all fiction. For my reader friends, the one on my nightstand now is "Influencer."

They talk about principles and ideas and never about other people in a negative light.

They purposely put themselves in situations where they have opportunity to learn, grow, and change for the better. They hang around people like that, too.

Other observations: Your income is the average income of the 5 people you spend most of your time with. For that reason, I've been seen lounging on the lawns of the rich and elite of Wichita lately. :)

We do become like the people we are around the most, like the TV shows we watch the most, like the the books we read, like the groups we belong to. It's always a good idea to check our progress in these areas. If we don't like what we see, we can always change it! That's the good part. We aren't stuck without hope of renewal or change.

So, back to the original thought, if I can't get "there" being the way I am, what changes are a good idea? How about changing just 1% a day for 100 days? Will that make for 100% improvement? According to performance experts it will make more like 300-400% improvement because of the compounded effect of change on top of change.

CANI - Anthony Robbins' acronym for Constant and Never-Ending Improvement is my mantra for the day! Change can be painful, but choosing to NOT change is even MORE painful. I choose change!