Beholden or Be Blessed

I believe that I am proficient and self-reliant. I actually heard myself say, “I have done as much as I can on my own, I need help now.” It struck me later how this is an extraordinary arrogant and stupid statement. It assumes that everything I have accomplished and all the blessings I’ve received have nothing to do with the help of others.

If I walk through life believing I don’t have help, I run the risk of pushing away those that can help me the most. Usually because these are the people who test me and show me the things about myself that I don’t want to see. They are my mirror in times of doubt and my anchor in times of need. But if I push them away when I see things I don’t like about myself, I will drawn when I need them the most.

As a child I was less sure about which mirrors to trust, but have found in my adult life that faith is what’s most important when making these choices. Intuition guides my heart and trust is a risk. Like any risk there is some exposure but also reward.

I realize that fear has made me believe that I walked alone. Living in fear keeps us isolated from feeling anything at all. Pain, laughter and true love. If we are afraid then we don’t have to feel. We have an excuse to do nothing and be nothing to those around us. Fear masquerades as proficiency and self-reliance so we are beholden to no one. But we are never truly alone, whether we acknowledge it or not. Though its my experience that it’s best to hold on to our mirrors and gussy up so we stay afloat during the storms.

Focus

Distraction is a comforting companion. I used it often to procrastinate on the important or clutter my activities. I find focus an illusive friend. Actually, focus does not play so hard to get, focus paired with prioritization are a rare coupling.

In all my years of consulting prioritization and focus is one of the most important problems to tackle first in business. This applies in life too.

If you sit down and think about all the things you want to work on in your life, it’s easy to get overwhelmed. But if you get pragmatic and make a list, you can pick one thing to focus on; the most important thing.

My guess, if you give laser focus to that one thing in your life and fix it, just that one thing, many other things will change on their own.

Laser focus. No distractions.

Another important point about focus, in business and life, is sticking with what you know. We’re all more confident when we know what we’re talking about and we are more comfortable in our own skin when we are confident about what we can deliver. Stay close to your base and build your skill set.

I’m laser focused on staying centered and enjoying diving deeper into my skills. Distraction will be lonely for a while.