Work may be a four letter word, but so is life

Work may be a four letter word, but so is life.

Just read a fantastic guest post by Sir David Garfinkle on John Carlton’s blog.

Sometimes we all need a good kick into ACTION

Given the big ole brains that read this blog and John Carlton’s,  my take may not be all that revelatory to you… but I truly believe this to be true and if it helps kick some of you into motion, then it’s well worth repeating (my clients and colleagues have surely heard me spout this before…)

Creating your own reality is scary business. Many entrepreneurs allow their head to float up into the clouds, dreaming of the possibilities, but they leave one foot firmly planted in “reality” – to be safe, grounded.

What we get out of life is what we most want at any given moment. Too often, what we most want is the security and safety of the familar.

Clinging to those external “safe harbors” is precisely what binds people and keeps them stuck in old patterns and relationships that have long since served their purpose. To keep moving forward, those patterns and habits have to replenished or completely replaced every so often with new, more immediately applicable resources.

To me, demanding the “unreasonable” from life is a remarkably permissive environment. But you’ve got to be receptive to opportunities when they present themselves – and they WILL.

You can declare your intention to reach a particular destination, but which route you take getting there is always a game-day call, isn’t it?

It’s not the big, bold promise of the future that magnetically pulls you toward your goal, it’s the baby steps along the way that get you there. All those little decisions, to do this or not do that, to ignore this person or to listen to another.

Choices present themselves a hundred times a day and with each one you make mindfully as a move toward your new reality, you strengthen your own congruence with it. With each decision, a whole series of events is set in motion that otherwise would never have entered your sphere of consciousness – because your mind would be elsewhere.

And all of that said, the most important part of the equation is WORK.

Musicians intrinsically understand the amount of practice it takes to become outstanding at their craft. Nobody forces them to sit in their bedroom for hours playing scales. The dream is the “big picture” but the “goal” in that moment is to nail the descending mixolydian triad that’s kicking your ass.

Work may be a four letter word, but so is life.

It takes work to succeed. It takes work to maintain success once you’ve achieved it, and even more work to continuing growing.

It also takes work to walk away from something that’s literally calling out to you to take action on – but you let fear and self-doubt sabotage it.

It takes work to procrastinate – actually MORE work than just doing whatever it is you keep putting off. Your mind is anxious because you know it’s not done.Your body is tense because your mind is anxious. Your concentration is limited because the little voice in the back of your head keeps pinging you about “that thing…”.

So, work is inevitable but it doesn’t have to be unpleasant! The fact that you aren’t enjoying what you’re working on is the tell-tale sign that you’re working on the wrong thing.

I used to have an sign hanging in my office that read:

“Luck is what happens when preparation and opportunity meet”.

Next to it was one that read:

“Whatever you can do, or think you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it”.

Both of these were to remind me that hard work is never in vain. That hard work is never wasted. 

Hard work is what aligns you with never-ending opportunity.

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