This post is about failure and success. It will likely resonate greatest with those who think big, create strategic plans and take risks to see those strategies executed.
Have you ever been an expert and helped many, and then found that you haven’t taken your own advice (or ignored it or were too busy to even consider your alignment) in your own life or work? Know of any divorced marriage counselors? ‘nuf said.
What do you do when you fall down? Until quite recently I used to bounce back, be proud of my resilience and kick myself now and again for letting it happen. I’ve discovered a better way and I want to share it now with you. You do not have to be pushin’ 50 to use this and you can be well above that age. It’s never too late to benefit yes? Just as I believe it is always time to give back (which is why I take time out for my blog even while running two companies and helping many more).
Here’s the edge: it is that failure — or what our World defines as failure, and for our discussion let’s go ahead and use that word and define it as when outcomes are not aligned with what was expected — can lead to something much better. AND the only way to get to that better place is to go through the failure.
When you know your vision and strategy…and you trust your intuition in addition to your numbers…and you are willing to accept that taking risk means you aren’t going to be 100% sure of every step you take … and you are willing to step out with confidence and learn from the outcomes…then you are almost there. If you are also willing to not attach to the means by which you stay aligned with strategy and realize your vision, then you can realize great benefits that make you say “what!? oh yes – wow!”
I’m going to share with you in this Series – “Leadership & Successful Risk-Taking” – a few of the pains that have kept me apart from this blog (one of many passions now in arrears) for the past three months and how, this time, I pushed beyond resilience and into some power zone where the most amazing and uplifting things are happening!
This Series is for you leaders out there…for all of you willing to push further (not harder), to be uncomfortable (very) so that you can realize the achievements you were meant to bring to our World.
Please join me. If you have a story to share or advice to give, please send to lori@collaborative-action.com or post a comment below!
Right on, Lori!
For me, this year has been a direct experience in what you describe. In retrospect, the team and I needed to experience the “failure” of our initial strategic plan to set the seeds for the larger success that is coming. We had to do it. To attempt otherwise would have led to a much larger non-recoverable failure, of that I’m convinced. Funny, because at the start of this project I would have thought that failure is failure and is to be avoided at all costs. Now I know: not true!
Congratulations! I’d love to hear more of your story. Truly very few people are willing to push that far in order to experience, as paraphrased from Kay Hendricks of “The Big Leap,” that wonderful thing that is trying to come out (of this pain). I’m happy to hear you have experienced it. You will bring great value to others (and I suspect you already do)!
While such a suggestion may seem fanciful, the seriousness of our present situation suggests that such flights of fancy might well be a small price to pay for helping talent contribute to a better world.
Thanks for contributing to our world!