Your Highest Freedom

One of my favorite books is Man’s Search for Meaning, written by Viktor Frankl, an Austrian psychotherapist who survived confinement in Nazi concentration camps. So many of those around him perished. They lost hope. They fell into despair, then death. He managed to get through the ordeal by applying what I believe is our highest human freedom: our ability to choose how we respond to and process any event that happens to us. We can look for some good or we can become haunted by the bad. Frankl writes, “everything can be taken from a person but one thing, the last of the human freedoms to choose one’s attitude to a given set of circumstances, to choose one’s way.” Such a magnificent thought.

“Everything can be taken from a person but one thing, the last of the human freedoms to choose one’s attitude to a given set of circumstances, to choose one’s way”

(these are not my thoughts J and are copied from Robin’s book)

Ask Powerful Questions

One of the fastest ways to find the solution to an issue or challenge you are facing is to ask the right question. The right question inevitably leads you to the correct answer. Questions matter. In business, remarkable performers are dazzlingly good at getting to the right question. The one that speeds them to the place they need to reach and offers them the missing piece they need to find. And in life, asking yourself a powerful question will allow you to step into a whole new set of possibilities that you may have missed while you were locked into an old way of seeing things. Like the lesson amid a so-called failure. Or the opportunity that inhabits a setback.

Here are six questions that I share with the clients with whom we do leadership development work. I suggest you write them down and then find some time today to answer them in your journal.

• What one thing – if I did it – would profoundly improve the way I work (and how I live)?
• What needs to happen between now and the end of the next 90 days for me to feel that this is the best quarter of my work and personal life? (remember, clarity precedes mastery)
• Who do I need to express appreciation to? (make your list long)
• What would I like to improve, professionally and personally?
• What could I be grateful for that I’m currently not grateful for?
• How do I want to be remembered at my retirement party?

And as you make this day extraordinary, I’ll leave you with one of the my favorite quotes (which comes from Mark Twain): “If everyone was satisfied with themselves, there would be no heroes”

“In businesses, remarkable performers are dazzlingly good at getting to the right question, the one that speeds them to the place they need to reach”

(these are not my thoughts J and are copied from Robin’s book)

Be Unreasonable

One of my favorite quotes comes from George Bernard Shaw, who noted, “the reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the unreasonable man”. Please think about that idea for a moment. I suggest it’s a big one.

Sure, be practical and operate intelligently as you move through your world. I agree, it’s important to use common sense. True, foolish risks can lead to difficult consequences. But having said that, don’t be so scared of failure and disappointment that you fail to dream. Don’t always be so reasonable and practical and sensible that you refuse to seize glorious opportunities when they show up. Push the envelope as to what’s possible for you. Remember, critics have always laughed at the visions of the bold thinkers and remarkable visionaries. Ignore them. And know that every outstanding piece of human progress was achieved through the heroic efforts of some one who was told their idea was impossible to realize. The world needs more dreamers. Unreasonable souls who fight the urge to be ordinary. Who resist the seduction of complacency and doing things the way they have always been done. You can be one of them. Beginning today.

Kahlil Gibran, in The Prophet, made the point for more beautifully than I ever could, when he wrote, “ the lust for comfort murders the passion of the soul”

“Remember, critics have always laughed at the visions of bold thinkers and remarkable visionaries. Ignore them”

(these are not my thoughts J and are copied from Robin’s book)