Flow Catalyst

Open Space Onet

Discovering our power to make good things happen

Please join us for a three-day event of, by and for the omidyar.net community and friends -- to build our capacity to make good things happen.

What:	Discovering Our Power to Make Good Things Happen
When:	July 14-16, 2006 pre-set schedule
Where:	Carleton Hotel, Oak Park, IL (http://www.carletonhotel.com and DirectionsToConference

You're Invited: This conference is for omidyar.net members, friends and anyone else to come together, make connections, have fun, do as much good work as each and every one of us can... and then go home, more connected, energized and capable of doing more and more of whatever we call good in the world. Come join a good party getting better! ...and bring your good friends, too!

Since you are reading this invitation, we know that someone thought you might be interested in joining this work.  Please join us to make good things happen!

• What kind of good things are happening because of the work you are doing in the world?
• What do you need to do in order for more good things to happen as a result of the work you really want to do?
• What skills, resources, gifts and connections do you have to share?
• What would happen if you could grow and get and share?

Come to Oak Park, Chicago and find out!

View the full invitation.

Greatness, Arrogance, Humility, and Confidence

In coaching we often talk about “owning your greatness” but where does that become arrogance? It is a value to be humble, but where does that interfere with being confident?

I have had several calls about this subject lately. And often when something keeps showing up in coaching calls, it is time to ask if this is something that is a theme for you as a coach as well. So I have been thinking about this for myself too. And when I talk about this issue, that fantastic quote of Marianne Williamson comes to mind:

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.
Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.
It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us.
We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?
Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God.
Your playing small does not serve the world.
There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do.
We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us.
It is not just in some of us; it is in everyone.
And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.
As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.

And, while I am not a believer in the God she refers to, I think she really describes this space of owning our own greatness not for the ego boost or public acclaim, but because we short change ourselves and the world if we do not put forth our best and claim our capabilities. So, here are some questions for you:

• Where are you being arrogant? And when you are being arrogant, what does that feel like your body? Is there tension or a sour taste in your mouth? Notice what you feel in your body when you are being arrogant.
• Where are you being your greatest? And when you are being your greatest, what does that feel like your body? Is there lightness or grounding? Notice what you feel in your body when you are being your greatest.
• When are you being humble? And what does that feel like in your body? Do your eyes look up or down? Notice what you feel in your body when you are being humble.
• Yep, you guessed it. When are you being confident? And what does that feel like in your body? What does your mouth do? Your eyes? Your back? Notice what you feel in your body when you are being confident.

So you have lots of things to pay attention to as you go about your day, so I will give you one thought that unlocks many answers for me. Maybe it will help you. For me, curiosity plays a major role in finding balance among these states of being. Personally, when I am being curious, I can’t be arrogant.

Five star days

You have seen star ratings on hotels and restaurants. How about starring your day?

First consider what qualities a five star day might have. Perhaps a day you exercise, eat well, enjoy time with people you care about, and accomplish something valuable to you, plus a big surprise benefit. A surprise could be a promotion, a sale, a new client, a great inspiring conversation, or a phenomenal movie. Whatever makes you smile from ear to ear on a given day. Then what might a four star or three star days look like? What would make a day into a one star day?

Next, begin rating your days. You can keep track on your calendar if you prefer.

This exercise is based on the assumption that you get more of what you measure. If you measure the quality of your day, you will begin to pay attention to the things that improve the quality of your day. You may notice when you have good days and begin to act in ways that give you more good days. If you notice low star days, you can work toward more good days.

Here is to more five star days! Cheers!

Clarity on your Criteria

If you know what your criteria are for the life you want, it can be much easier to decide how you want to allocate your time. To get clarity on your critieria, list what is important to you. Then prioritize by asking this questions, "It is okay if I can have this, but not that." Replacing "this" and "that" with your criteria until you have a list in an order that works for you. It may only take me two lines to convey this, and it may take you days to get a satisfactory list. Be patient.

Consider that when you say yes to one thing that you are saying no to a host of other options. I say yes to working late which means I end up saying no to having personal time. Does that work for me? I say yes to helping my sister out over the weekend which means I end up saying no to tea with a friend.

Are you okay with saying no to the other options? Most of the time, we don't think of the things we might be saying no to until later or not at all. And this is fine usually, since we are okay with the choice we made. For people who prefer to have options, making a choice and thus saying no to the other options can be very difficult. For options people, getting clear on criteria can release the tension around making decisions.

 

 

Create your world your way.

Using Time

When deciding how you want to use your time, consider what are you getting out of particular activites? Learning? Intellectual stimulation? Finincial gain? Social connection? Phyisical connection? You pick. I left out numerous benefits you could be getting.

For example, I want to use my time to read about coaching. Directly, from what I read, I learn. I feel stimulated intellectually. Indirectly, I have information that helps me develop better relationships with people. I may even learn how to work more efficiently to earn more money.

What is what you are getting worth to you? Measured by time or money or fulfillment.

Using our example, let's create a scale. My time directed toward learning about coaching for me is very valuable. Let's say it is a 5. I don't directly earn money from it, but indirectly, I enable myself to earn money with improved skills. So for money, I will give learning a 4. And for fulfillment, I am very fulfilled by learning, so I will give it a 5. Contract this with doing the laundry for the antithesis. Laundry is not worth my time except that I need it to be done, so I give it a 1 for time. For money, well, again, it doesn't give me any money (except that random $5 I find in a pocket!). However, without clean clothes, my clients may not take me very seriously. So again, 1. And fulfillment, I do enjoy doing laundry more than cleaning bathrooms, but I don't enjoy it half so much as reading. I will say 1 again.

I want more activities at the 5 level. Say things that total 12 points or more? I want to reduce activities that I would scale, as a total, under 6. For these things, I might hire someone else, exchange chores with my roomie or partner, or do them less often.

What do you want more of in your life? What would that get for you? What would that be worth to you?

What do you want less of in your life? What will less of that get for you? What would that be worth to you?

You may not be up for all the math of assigning numbers. Maybe you decide you can simply do greater than and less than signs. Use a method that works for you. Examine how you are spending your time. Keep what works. Focus on what you want to do more of. Let go of activities that drain your energy to the extent you can. Free yourself up. Create your world your way.

Stagnant Goals

                       

I read a great article recently from Authentic Happiness. Basically, it asserted that we poorly predict how happy achieving a goal will make us. Failing to achieve them doesn't make us less happy. Authentic Happiness writer Ben Dean, PhD, sited a study from the economist Richard Easterlin which states that happiness is not tied to financial wealth past about $25,000. That means that earning $250,000 or $35,000 will make you equally happy.

Do an inventory of your goals. Which ones are stagnant goals that don't fit you anymore? Which ones won't really make you happy?

Usually stagnant goals are tangible, for example, "I want to get that promotion" or "I want to buy that home." Recycle your stagnant goals. Transform "I want to buy that home" to something that meets the same or a deeper need, such as, "I want to have an environment that soothes me and a private space of my very own."

Goals that resonate with who you are on a deep level will be energizing and manifest easily. As you go through your list of goals, consider whether they resound inside you. Do an energy check. When you think about a particular goal, does your body lighten up or sag down?

Make sure that what you are working toward will indeed reward you in the way you want to be rewarded. There can be many paths to achievement, choose the one that works best for who you are.

Learning Your Way to Success

                       

Did you not meet a goal you have set for yourself? Some people might call it failure. I prefer to think of it as learning. What we believe about success impacts how successful we can be. Do you think success is hard? Does success have to come on the first try? It may be easy to say no to these questions, but a little digging around and reflection may reveal that you have some beliefs about success that hinder your ability to achieve it.

To think about success in a different way, consider the following questions:

• In what ways have I been successful? (Do more of what you are good at!)
• How can I build on what I have created successfully?
• If my end goal is too big, what can I do today or this week that would be a successful step toward my goal? And when I do that act today or this week, how can I acknowledge that progress?
• What will failure get for me? (If you really dig here, you may find that failing either gets another desire satisfied OR/AND failure gets you knowledge that you can use--what is to fear about that?)

Thanks for thinking!

Soundtrack of Our Lives

                       

Great band, by the way.  I saw them in San Francisco last spring.

So what is the soundtrack of your life?
If you put this moment to music, what would it sound like?

What do you want it to sound like?
What state do you want to be in to invoke those sounds?

How can you become the composer of your life? If you did become your composer, what would that sound like? What would your life look like? When are you going to start living that way? What is stopping you? What do you want to do to free yourself up to be what you want and sound how you want to sound?

Can you root your song in your mind so that whenever you hear it you can remember that this is what your life sounds like or is moving toward?

Play the song when you need to reconnect with that vision of your life.

Change

In the air? Change. I hear so many stories right now of people and organizations changing. Some embrace the change while others resist it.

There are a few things I have noticed and want to share with you. Those that embrace change are willing to have a shift in the story they are telling about themselves. Those that resist are attached to a story they have told before.

In the end -- and by that I mean in the larger frame of life and existence -- we are each and all on a journey. This is the story of our lives. It is not necessarily the story that we tell people when we meet them or promote as the evolution of our business or career. That is a small story of our perception and dreams. That is the story we want or the one we choose to remember. The story of our journey is the one that is happening to us everyday whether we choose it or not. It is the story of our evolution as a person, as an organization, or as a species.

When you honor the story of your evolution, you become flexible to telling a new story about your goals and dreams. You open yourself to change, to responding to a changing environment and changing relationships. If you attach yourself to the story of your perception and dreams, then you stagnant in a vision created at a particular moment in time responding to that moment, those perceptions, needs, and circumstances. When this happens, you become attached to earning money, getting a return on the projects you invest in, and keeping the relationships you have. You take a risk on those dreams and goals turning out in the way that you want them to. When you release that attachment, and instead choose the journey of your own evolution, then no matter how things turn out, it is part of your journey for you to learn from and become from.

When you attach to your journey, there is no failure. There is only feedback. There is only learning. There is only becoming. No matter what happens it adds to your experience, your being, and your story. You can loose those you love, and it becomes about the experience you had with them rather than about the loss of future experiences with them. You can loose a treasured dream, and it becomes about the process of dreaming and manifesting your goals. You learn.

While you may think this is hard, you do it all the time. Let’s say Jane is running her own business. The economy lags, and Jane has to let go of her business to go work for someone else. She can be attached to her identity as a sole-proprietor or she can perceive that this business was one phase she needed to go through to become Jane today. Without that experience she would not be who she is with her current capabilities, perspective, and knowledge. If she is attached to her identity as a sole-proprietor, she will suffer depression for loosing that identity. If, and more likely, when, she identifies herself as Jane, with her unique abilities and her own journey through life, she will be released from her depression and embrace her new life. And it is in our nature as people to, at some point, reflect on our experiences and believe that it all happened for the better, that we could not be who we are today without things working out the way they have.

What are you attached to? What identity are you holding on to? Where is the distinction between your identity and your roles? What is the story you are telling yourself about your past, present, and future? How is that different than the evolving story of your life?

Invest in the journey of your life and reap a life of immeasurable returns. For if you invest, as many of us do, in the story you want to tell yourself and the goals associated with that story, you do indeed take big risks. Some of which will pay off, and some of which will not. Mitigate your risk. Bank on something guaranteed to give your huge returns. Invest in your journey. Invest in the experience of your life wherever it takes you.