By the Ocean
Clear 72 Degrees
5:16 a.m.
We have a lot of stories we tell ourselves in business. That’s because we have a lot of stories we tell ourselves in life. Stories about good and bad, stories about how we want things to go and how we don’t want them to go.
Maybe some are true, but my hunch is most are not. At least not at first. If you keep telling yourself a story about something, eventually it becomes true. Either in reality or just in your perception. The effect is the same.
Let’s take our stories about products and services. What’s a “successful” product?
Our story says it is a product that delivers value to the marketplace, something that people want, something that people will buy.
That seems valid to me! Certainly, in many instances that IS true. It’s the instances where it is not true that create the issues.
Those are the times when it becomes obvious that our stories make us blind, or miserable, or both.
One of my clients entered my world by purchasing what my story says is a “failed” product for $199. This was something that IS valuable, according to me. The rest of the world never got the memo.
But this one being (and a few others) did. Except, I’m not sure I can call a product “failed” that generates a client relationship of $143,748. Because that’s what happened. And it’s not over yet.
Is that failing? Succeeding? Something else? I guess if that’s failing, I should probably do more of it. I guess if it’s succeeding, I should do more of that as well.
It seems that no matter WHAT my story is, the answer is onward.
Why does the story even matter? Because the STORY we tell ourselves is what creates our experience of reality. It is a major point of leverage and our direct energetic contribution to the future that gets created.
Oops.
The Universe (whatever you call that force, God, etc.) seems to know what you do not know. This force of consciousness, divinity, magic fairy dust, whatever, knows what’s going on here. Your perspective or guesses about all that don’t really matter so much.
So I’ve found you can profoundly shift your experience of life and business by acknowledging that, by feeling that. You can stop trying to “figure it out” and repurpose that energy on something with value.
What does that feel like? It feels like PEACE. Go ahead. Try it. I’ll wait… (start with a deep breath)
What happens if you treat everything that happens in your business as a gift? What if you greet each new event that enters your reality as yet another opportunity to do something great?
Can you feel the immediate transformation that would create in HOW YOU FEEL about everything? About everyone?
Does that feel good?
Are we allowed to feel good in business? Is that even “legal?” Or is that only allowed after we sell the business, get that “exit” and realize we have to go searching for meaning in our lives because we don’t feel any better than we did before?
Do we even know what we’re trying to achieve?
Perhaps it’s not the achievements that are the issue but the way we define what it is we’re trying to achieve that creates the problems.
What is success?
Do we know?
Is success a place we really want to go? Are we already there? Or is the hunt for success simply the outward projection of an internal lack we think money, fame, attention, or acceptance can provide?
If the outside world is a reflection of your inside world, doesn’t it make sense that you’d have to be “rich” on the inside first?
What would that feel like? Maybe you should practice THAT? I wonder what would happen then…