Monday 4 February 2008

Living Inside Out

Over the last 12 months or so I have been lucky enough to complete a number of "personal development" programs and events. Each of these was different and I played very different roles fro participant to coach to leader of the team. One of concepts that has really stayed with me and changed my outlook on life has been the concept of "be, do have" as a driving force for how to live life. It is not the first time that I have been exposed to this concept (one of the best is Stephen Covey's 7 Habits) but it really stuck with me. This happened when I was at StepUp and at once I understood that I had been living my life the wrong way round. I have subsequently built on this understanding so that for the first time I now believe I understand the power of identity to shape my experience in life.

What exactly do I mean by living my life the wrong way round? Well I spend large parts of my life focusing on what I what to have. As I reflect on this I think this is a reflection of my and societies focus on goals and achieving goals. Focusing on goals isn't bad but actually if all you do is focus on the goal this doesn't actually help you to achieve the goal. An example. Those who know me probably privately wonder why I never address the issue of my excessive weight. The reality of my life is I think about this all the time and over the years I have created many very detailed goals and images of how I would like my body to look. As I look back some of these goals or images are quite funny and embarrassing. At one stage the six million dollar man loomed large because why wouldn't you want to be able to run at 60 miles per hour!!! One thing you can be certain of is none of these images had excess body fat!! . As I get older and thought I knew more about goal setting this process became quite sophisticated. You could guarantee I had SMART goals!! (SMART - specific, measurable, attainable, realistic, time bound). But here I am not the trim bloke of my visions!!

So why didn't I achieve my goal. The answer probably seems obvious - I didn't actually do anything!!! Or to be more precise I didn't do anything different than I had been doing previously or if I did I didn't keep it up or do it well enough!! So focusing on what you want to have is useless unless it translates into consistent action to achieve. No let's reconsider. Focusing on your goals is worse than useless unless it leads to action. Worse than useless because as you focus on what you want to have, you come to inescapable conclusion that your life is not what it should be or that you want it to be!!! If this sense of lacking is a consistent experience it's depressing. Ever noticed that when you are depressed or in my case perhaps more realistically "a little down" the last thing you think about doing is taking serious action to achieve something. As time goes by and the goal doesn't happen you begin to realise you're unlikely to ever have it and you give up. What a BUMMER that feeling is!!

So focusing on what you want to have is great but getting it requires that you do something. Actually it requires that you do whatever it takes to achieve the goal!! So how do you get yourself to do something?? Knowledge is not enough. I know what I need to do to loose weight and create the body and energy levels I want. Indeed we all know. Eat less (and more healthily) and exercise more. It's a basic law of the universe - energy in minus energy out equals’ weight gain or weight loss.

So how do I get myself to act? Perhaps more precisely who would I need to be in order to do things that need to be done to have the result? I pondered this problem for quite some time with no real success. Then it hit me!! The insanely simple truth is I would have to be the type of person who exercised more and ate less!! So what's stopping me?? This answer came quickly. I am not the sort of person who exercises quickly and who wants to eat good nutritious food!! It is not how I see myself. Yes I have just discovered the power of identify. Who you believe you are governs who you are!!

This raises two big questions. Who do I actually believe I am? How do I change who I think I am (and do I really want to)? This is too much for one little story and I am not sure I actually know the answer!!! For now however I have a breakthrough - live life from the inside out - BE-DO-HAVE.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

This blog very instructive. What do you think about visualisation, and the saying: " Everything a man conceive and believe he acheive. it's all about conviction, as you who I think I am.

Owen McCall said...

This Napoleon Hill quote is excellent and similar to another one I love which is everything is created twice. First in the mind and then in the real world. The trick is having conceived it you then need to move to action to create it in the real world. Sometimes that is difficult especially if it is not something you normally do. I suggest in this case going back and reviewing your identity and who you believe you are that is stopping you.