A beautiful thing

I’ve helped out a lot of businesses with their strategic planning. A fill-in-the-blank alternative would’ve been cheaper for them but wouldn’t do much good. The crux of the process isn’t answering questions. It’s teaching them to erase all of their mindsets, assumptions, fears, comfort zones, etc. and start with a clean slate to create the best possible thing, given present conditions and future trends. And, most importantly, to do so without limiting themselves with assumption of barriers, restrictions, possibilities, historical procedures and policy or any other inhibiting factors.

That’s a challenge because we’re taught to think convergently, with little time spent on divergently. That is, true or false. Or, is the one and only answer A, B, C or D? There are very few tests that ask something like, without regard to all convention, what would be the best possible answer(s) to this? Or, that accept that there are many answers.

Life management is much the same. I’ve seen many people who aren’t especially happy and few do anything about it. “I majored in accounting, I’ve worked as an accountant for 20 years, ergo, I’m an accountant.” Yeah, but what if at this juncture you’d really enjoy being a designer? “I started playing golf in high school. I’ve golfed all my life. I have a couple thousand tied up in gear. I’m a golfer.” Even if you’re not that good and it is a source of frustration for you? You can apply the same thing to any phase of your life.

Today we had a “reunion” luncheon for our Leadership Cincinnati class. I’ve bumped into a lot of these people over the past 25 years and, outside of some progression, nothing much changes with them.

Today, I sat across the table from Penny. She’s a financial genius and has had leadership and ownership roles in top investment companies. I’d lost touch with her over the past couple years and asked her what she was up to. That was more than being polite. She looked more buoyant than I’ve ever seen her.

She’s in the process of wrapping up her latest financial venture and then heading for California to become certified as a touch healer. It’s a passion she’s harbored inside of her for some time and finally decided to do something about it. She was so excited that it was contagious and a joy to share.

Most people build walls around themselves with fears, doubts and assumptions, and remain a prisoner of their qualms. Penny’s one of the few who broke through. It’s a beautiful thing.