WHAT DO YOU WANT?

Seems like a simple enough question.  But the truth of the matter is a great number of people have no idea what they want or desire to have in life.  As children we want everything.  Our thinking is so open to possibility that wanting or dreaming of something special in our lives is just a natural part of being.  So what happens?  The short answer is LIFE happens.  For some, life circumstances begin to overtake our open mindedness and we begin to close up.  Then we reach thirteen and life is getting really hard.  There’s pressure from our peers to fit in, our own desire to be independent and the feeling that we will never be enough for our parents.  And we just stop dreaming.  We stop playing.  And slowly we begin to die within ourselves.  Decades may pass and all we have done is existed.  Worked hard, raised our families and gotten old having never fulfilled any of our childhood, or even our adult wants and dreams.

It has been my experience in working with people in the personal development industry that when asked the question, “What Do You Want?” most struggle with it.  Even with the idea they could have a million bucks to do what one wants, people struggle.  And those few that could name a couple of items typically name off something for someone else.  Give to a foundation; help their children or some other place of need outside themselves.  All great things to do and they leave themselves out of the equation.  We have become so accustomed to existing that we put ourselves last at the very best.

I challenge you to sit down with a pen and paper and write out twenty-five things that you have always wanted to do or have.  Maybe it’s a trip to a foreign country, a new car, a new house or some other tangible item.  Take the time right now and put it to paper.  And while you are thinking and writing take notice of the way you feel.  Is there excitement, sadness, indifference or some other feeling you can describe?  Then look for what is behind these feelings.  Discovering the time, place and event that you first remember when you stopped dreaming and wanting can be a powerful way to turn your dream switch back on.

If you find you need assistance with this contact Klemmer & Associates at klemmer.com and enroll into one of their many personal development seminars.  On Monday nights at 7PM PDT you can sign up for the Online Champion’s Workshop.  Or enroll into a live interactive Champions Workshop that is being held somewhere close to you.  And close could simply mean a plane flight away.  From either of these introductory classes you can enroll into Personal Mastery, a powerful, experiential seminar that will help you discover those self-limiting beliefs you have that are keeping you stuck.

I encourage you to take action today.  You deserve to have all the desires of your heart, which come to you as dreams and wants.  You’ve nothing to loose and everything to gain.

Presented to you by:

John Edwards
Advanced Leadership Seminar Facilitator

The quest for immediate gratification and happiness has become so profound in western civilization that sadness as an emotion in response to normal life stressors has lost its value.  As such, there are now studies that claim one in ten Americans suffer from some form of depression.  It is of course a diagnosis that is best left in the hands of professionals but it does raise questions about how we as a society treat those moments in our lives that are not a constant flow of joy and happiness.  There are very few of us who have not experienced a feeling of complete despair at same point in our lives. It might be because of a personal loss that we have suffered: an unaccomplished goal, a financial setback, a debilitating illness, or any number of obstacles that seem overwhelming. Some of us know how to ride these slumps by recognizing that sadness in our lives is a perfectly normal emotion that is part of our human experience. Some of us understand that we will choose our experience of sadness based on the viewpoint that we are prepared to take. But what happens when that sadness and despair become a way of life.  What happens when the only choices we see perpetuate that isolation until it spirals into the most drastic choice of all, giving up on life. What happens when we place a greater value on death over life?

Suicide is the eighth leading cause of death in the United States and the third leading cause among young people aged 15-24.  This is disturbing not just because of the devastating outcome for lives that will never reach adulthood but because it also signifies a choice made by someone to opt out of life.  It is difficult to comprehend how a person could make that choice without understanding what they went victim to.  It is impossible to rationalize even if we understand there might have been help via an intervention, medical or otherwise.  What is clear is that our capacity to give ourselves a greater array of viewpoints in our choices can help us see life as the outcome regardless of circumstances.

So to all of our grads and friends we send our love and support to any of you who have somehow been affected by such a situation and know that at Klemmer & Associates we will continue to create a world that works for everyone with no one left out!

Every day we have countless conversations that start with, “Hi, How are you”? We usually respond automatically by saying “Fine, thanks” and the conversation evolves naturally from there.

But, what if your response was not automatic? What if the response you chose reflected more accurately or truthfully the state of mind you were experiencing at that moment? That doesn’t mean that you’re response is going to send the other party running in the opposite direction because you said “I’m crazy,” but… what if it was a reply that was a little more thoughtful?

Maybe instead of saying “I’m fine thanks,” you said one of the following: “Well I’m puzzled today” or “I’m curious” or “I’m excited” or “I’m uncertain” You would likely get a completely different reaction to the question “How are you?” And that’s a good thing! It highlights that we can start a conversation without having to focus on a single expected response that determines that everything is okay. It gives us permission to have a conversation that treats a whole range of emotions as part of normal every day activity. By always saying “I’m fine, thanks” we make an assumption that we need to be fine!

What we need to be instead, is honest. Let’s take off the sunglasses (those belief systems we examine at Personal Mastery and Leadership Training) that can only start a conversation with a single point of view. When we start a conversation by acknowledging a different emotion, other than feeling fine, we are allowing the other person to interact with us at a more meaningful level. We have given them, and us, permission to be engaged in a discussion that is not just observing the niceties of dialogue but opens up a more meaningful conversation.

That is not to say that there isn’t a time when the automatic response isn’t appropriate but perhaps a gradual shift to doing something a little differently will give us the opportunity to accept that the broader range of emotions that we experience on a daily basis are also a natural and acceptable part of our life. We don’t have to be fine all the time! And maybe that’s the point. By recognizing how many ways of ‘being’ there are, we can all be less focused on having to be ‘fine’.

Have you set a few HUGE 2011 goals yet? If you’re like me, I’m sure you have and you’re getting after them. If not, stop reading this and set a few goals NOW! Two full months into 2011, are you on track, behind or are you ahead of schedule in achieving them?

In interviewing nine successful entrepreneurs, including Brian Klemmer, Donna Johnson and Collette Larsen just to name a few, for my best-selling book, Time-Out! Winning Strategies for Playing a Bigger Game in Life, I found that not only did they all set goals for themselves, they also implemented accountability components to them. Accountability is a key for your success. Without it, your self-limiting beliefs will get the best of you when it gets uncomfortable and will usually derail you. In other words, when you are outside your comfort zone going after something you’ve never accomplished before, you will feel differently than you have ever felt before. Why? Because you are living and playing in the realm of possibility not probability – a place you haven’t been before.

In the next 48 hours, find a person that you can either pay to hold you accountable such as a coach, enroll in Samurai Camp if you’re a Heart graduate, or find someone you deeply respect or admire and ask them to hold you accountable. Then set up a weekly accountability call and STICK to it! In fact, place a stick or carrot as a consequence or reward when either you accomplish your goals or not. THAT will “up” your intention. Now go out and create the life of your dreams!

Embrace Risk, Embrace Success in 2011!

Tom Haupt, Personal Mastery Facilitator
Leadership Training

February gives new meaning to the words blah….blah….blah.  It’s the month with the least number of days yet feels like the longest. Our new year’s resolutions are waning and we have started to settle back into a familiar rut of doing what’s comfortable. Sound familiar?  Our programs/belief systems are like homing pigeons who take the message they’ve received and regardless of circumstances they follow the familiar path back to where they started.  And because the path is well worn and predictable there is no desire to change the path as so much of this cycle takes place at the subconscious level.  Hence the benefit of Personal Mastery. As most of you know this seminar is designed to create awareness around just those programs that I am referring to that often don’t serve us and quite frankly feed into making what can be a challenging time even more difficult!

The dreariness of the February landscape (especially for those of us that live in areas where we experience radical shifts between seasons) has us being far more introspective because we don’t want to venture out. We throw up our hands and exclaim “oh well” without looking any further to see if there is another path for us.  It is much more comfortable to reside in the doldrums because we don’t have to take any action and we can settle in and turn our focus inward and be smug about how we think the world is treating us.

Sometimes, however, out of nowhere, the external world jolts us back into reality and we are drawn out of our self-created cocoon to be reminded that there are people who have been shocked out of their own comfortable existence.  Take the very recent events in New Zealand where hundreds are suddenly missing and thousands more are affected by a natural disaster. There is no complacency for those people and while survival becomes paramount, how they choose to deal with the disaster is very much a choice.  Choices will involve being proactive about next steps, whether that means helping a neighbor, praying for relief, offering monetary assistance, rallying resources to overcome obstacles or expressing gratitude for their own safety.

This disaster highlights that despite our own inability to be in control the circumstances of our environment, we can control how we choose to behave in the face of tragedy.  We can choose to be humbled by the force of nature and know that we can be resilient and be ready for any upcoming trials.  We can be uplifted by people around the world who will be moved to act because they have chosen to take themselves out of their own February blahs to look around at others in need. But most of all, we can choose to remember that we are not alone; there is a greater community that we are all part of regardless of where we reside physically.

So whatever the weather or wherever you are, remember that we choose our experience based on the viewpoint we are prepared to take. It takes great effort at times to step into being a Compassionate Samurai. And if you’re not prepared to do it for yourself, then perhaps you are big enough to do it for someone else.

Sona van der Hoop – Director of Facilitation
Leadership Development