Your Life, Your Choice

Les Brown said, “The key to success is discovering your innate power and using it daily.”  

The power to make new choices and take new actions is yours every day!

Debbie Ford, in her book “The Right Questions”, says that choice may just be the greatest gift we’ve ever been given.

It’s so exciting to see that our lives today are directly related to the choices, decisions and actions we have taken in the past. Because, if we want to reach our goals and our vision and live the life we desire; all we have to do is to make choices and take actions that are in alignment with what we truly want.

We often wonder, how did I get here? What happened? It’s like we have been on autopilot without connecting our choices and actions to the results we are experiencing. We think, as Debbie says, that small choices don’t matter. EVERY CHOICE MATTERS! We are either moving in the direction we want or in the opposite direction. There are no neutral choices.

Ask The Right Questions on a cork notice board

Making this year the best ever:

  1. Spend a few minutes every day reviewing your vision.
  2. Before making a choice and taking action, ask yourself a powerful question:
    “Will this choice propel me toward an inspiring future or will it keep me stuck in the past?
  3. With this new level of clarity and awareness; make choices that support what you really want.

What is your heart’s desire?

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Resolution

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Vision

 

Thank goodness January is over! It can be so heartbreaking to start with resolutions built on need to, have to, should do, shouldn’t do, etc. etc. Hopefully those incompletions and resentments from the past have fallen away as they typically do.  No, I don’t hate January, I love it.  But I especially love the fresh start when I am inspired by possibility.

Now the question is:
What do you REALLY want? What is your heart’s desire?

If you could have your leadership and life look exactly the way you want, what would that be? If this year were the best year of YOUR LIFE, what would you see happening? What would it feel like?

Why Have a Vision?
Leadership is an inside job. What will you stand for in your work and life? Without a vision, it’s like going on a journey but not knowing where you’re headed, no destination. How will you know when you have arrived? How will you adjust course when you need to? How will you know not to give up or get discouraged because you’re still “driving” but haven’t arrived? It can serve as a pin on the map of possibility. Your vision can be like a GPS, saying turn around when possible.

  • A vision acts like a magnet pulling us forward.
  • It acts as a compass helping us determine which choices and actions to take. Here’s the thing: There are no neutral choices! They either lead us toward our vision or away from it. (Debbie Ford)
  • Walter Bennis said: “Leadership is the capacity to translate Vision into Reality. Vision naturally leads us to the right actions and behaviors.
  • When we are looking toward the future, we are no longer reliving the past and recreating it through making the same comfortable choices over and over. We are choosing behaviors and taking actions that are possibility based. We easily see which behaviors when consistently used, will most likely lead us in the direction we want.
  • “The best way to predict the future is to create it.” ~ Abraham Lincoln
  • Set the pin on the map and focus our attention in that direction consistently and the possibility is astounding.
  • Focusing on possibility gives us strength and courage. It inspires us to get out of the well worn pathways of old habits, old personality traits, worn out ways of being and thinking that we yearn to let go of. The latest neuroscience shows clearly that it’s so much easier to fall into habit than forge a new path. However, it’s possible to let go of outdated ways of thinking and seeing the world, and it is a sure fire way to get what you really want, that until now, you haven’t been willing to go for!

Leadership is an inside job! The greatest gift we have been given is the gift of choice. What are you choosing?

Next Steps:

2015: What do you want in your Life and Leadership?

  • Make your vision real! Write it out in detail, in present tense, as though it has already happened.
  • Post your Vision and read it daily.
  • Determine what values are important to you. What will you stand for? Click here to find your values.
  • Determine 1-3 behaviors that when consistently performed, will naturally lead you toward your vision. Incorporate your top 3-5 values daily.
  • Start taking action and check in frequently to course correct as necessary.

Let me know how you are doing!

Three Steps to Creating Powerful Productive Relationships

Image from Dreamstimes

Image from Dreamstimes

Have you ever walked away from a meeting or conversation and wondered, “What just happened?” Maybe you had high expectations about this meeting or this conversation and it ended poorly or maybe it was wildly successful and you aren’t quite sure how this happened. Maybe you left wondering “how can I recreate the results of this meeting or this conversation?”

Often we go through our day without being intentional. Our schedules can be jam packed and we don’t realize how taking a few minutes to be conscious in our interactions can create powerful results.

However, when you are clear about your intentions, the results can be astounding!
You lead with clarity, energy and possibility, creating amazing relationships and bottom line results!

To achieve the results you want and have them occur with greater and greater predictability, set powerful intentions for yourself, the participants in the conversation or meeting and for the end result.

HERE’S HOW: [Read more…]

Leadership Skills: The # 1 Secret To Being On Purpose

One of the most important leadership skills is having a clear direction.

By this I mean are you on purpose? Are you waking up on fire? Are you so on fire with purpose that those to-do lists and irritating daily tasks just become part of the easy flow of your day?

If your answer is no, Mary Bryan, I am not; or no, not lately, then I acknowledge you for being human and welcome you to this conversation. [Read more…]

Who’s Making the Decisions? You or your Shadow?

Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool that I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life.  Because almost everything – all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure – these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important.  Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

Steve Jobs

I just received an email from one of my mentors, Steve Chandler, with this quote.  While it was jolting, of course it had me thinking – when is it time to let go of all the masks? Were you taught that it’s not OK to take care of yourself, that it’s selfish? Were you taught that it’s OK to be successful but not wildly successful? Are these shadow beliefs calling the shots in your life? They hang out, just beyond your awareness.  That’s why they’re called shadow beliefs and they determine what we can have, who we are being, and what we can accomplish in our lives. They call the shots. We all have them. [Read more…]

How To Use Frustration as A Valuable Leadership Tool

If Leadership is about being of service, and if the desire to serve flows naturally from the heart (when we allow it), what gets in the way? Lack of self-awareness and lack of presence.

And what gets in our way of really being awake and aware in the moment? [Read more…]

The Art of Delicious Service


“I don’t know what your destiny will be, but one thing I know: The ones among you who will be really happy are those who have sought and found how to serve.”
— Albert Schweitzer [Read more…]

On becoming a Person of Influence

 

I was reading an excellent review by George Ambler of Jeremy Kubicek’s book Leadership is Dead and in it the author says  that Leadership is about being a person of influence. The choice is whether to use that power of influence to dominate or liberate. He posits that the desire for self preservation keeps leaders from stepping into a position of influence that liberates those they serve.

In our work, leaders are focused on bringing their unique talents and gifts to those they serve. Becoming influential requires us to be ruthlessly self aware. It requires a willingness to be 100% responsible for ourselves. When we show up in our leadership, awake and aware, taking 100% responsibility for ourselves and our own results, we inspire and invite others by who we are being.

So why don’t we always do that? [Read more…]