Most of us get fired up at the beginning of every year, especially from crossover nights and other related services with varied inspired catchy phrases and words.
But the steam and fire dwindle as January drags its feet till it travels for 100 days, though it is just 31 days in the month. We all can relate to this character of January, coupled with February and March, then the reality of who we are, how we have positioned and aligned into the year shows up.
Then we begin to have our fire and inspiration light deeming and frustration setting in. We even wonder if all the plans and goals we set really meant anything.
Many of us fall for the trick of mostly what we think is possible for us, what we think to achieve, and the applause we desire to get when finally, it all gets opened.
The majority of us forget that these thoughts we create often have no connection to our purpose in life, the why we exist, the deep-seated feeling our goals must bring. Instead, we set it on success and forget the significance (legacy) and inner satisfaction of our priorities and aspirations should establish.
We are more than just thinking beings; we have brains in the skull, the chest cavity called the heart, and the stomach called guts (intuition). So your goals must have compassion rooted in your personal identity of values and the logic of your brain’s functionalities.
For this essential essence, I encourage everyone to possibly set their goals with a professional coach in the equation through a thought-provoking and creative process. This brings about a 360-degree perspective and questioning your set goals that will bother your being, which encapsulates your mind, heart, and intuition with your skills, attitude, and knowledge.
Self-impacting, community benefits, and corporate growth shifts have been spearheaded by many individuals with professional coaches (mostly called life coaches) in their corner in the last four decades and more. Globally, leadership and human resource management have moved into the era of a coaching embedded phenomenon for the kind of results corporate bodies in FTSE 100, fortune 500, etc., and beyond. The world of work, human resource management, and human capital development is swiftly changing in shame and form with a more profound impact from the coaching industry.
Coaches support you to curate your goals with compassion, courage, and creativity with an end game of fulfillment, significance, and satisfaction that anchors your wellbeing and impact on others.
Below are some depths of what must occur to build agency for personal growth and development.
- Build a healthy self-relationship:
In the story of Moses, when he had an encounter with God, he was questioned what he had in hand, he said a rod.
He was asked to throw it on the ground, and it turned into a snake, so God asked him to pick it up, and it turned into a rod again. This metaphor is likened to our relationship with ourselves regarding our potentials, abilities, and gifts. Many of us are afraid of our potentials, while others demean our gifts because we fixate on others’. Organic growth is driven by what is in the soil, which is unseen by naked eyes, so what relationship do you have with yourself? This is purely neuroscience; the kind of relationship you have with yourself is what you produce in deeds and actions.
You cannot give back anything to yourself which you originally don’t have. If you want love, confidence, drive, mental stability, emotional stability, etc., you must have that relationship with yourself first before sharing it with other people. It takes hurting people to hurt others. People without self-trust cannot produce trust with others. So what is your self-value, what are you worth, how do you embrace your potentials, who are you to yourself?
- Is your worldview glass half-full or half-empty? Abraham also had an encounter with God, And God brought him forth abroad, and said, Look now toward heaven, and tell the stars, if thou be able to number them: and he said unto him, So shall thy seed be.
Through neuroscience, it has been established that whatever your mind’s eyes can perceive, your entire mind develops the corresponding biological chemicals in the body to power or dull things into being. If your glass is half full, your mind identifies with a springboard to bounce off high into profound possibilities. But if it is half empty, your mind also triggers scarcity or hoarding mentality not to explore the possibility. You can go as far as your mind’s eye can see, so the question is, what do you see in your seven spheres of personal and corporate influence?
- The awareness and consciousness that opportunities are buried in challenges:
Diamond is one of the hardest expensive precious minerals in the world. But it goes through several challenges to the size smaller than the initial state it was mined. Meaning the value of the diamond is a result of the obstacles (processes) it endured over time and pressure. If you lose the 360-degree view of the end value of your goals in sight, you cannot fire your goals into valuable essentials.
Every opportunity is mined out of challenges, this is the bedrock of quantum beings, but your perception of the challenge causes you to mine possibilities or enrich your impossibilities.
- Deal with your SEEDS biases: We are experiential beings with vital memory records, which start from the fetus stage of our development. Our nature and nurturing create potent memories, which sometimes become blocks to our ability to explore who we are by the design of our infinite maker. But a careful conscious debugging, especially with professionals such as coaches, can debug some of these naturally inherited bugs that stifle the exploration of our potentials. We are hardwired with freeze, fight, and flee responses, and our brains are so good at them without blinking.
Some of our memories form various biases, and some even become so unconscious that we don’t know they are there.
This SEEDS bias was developed initially by the Neuroscience Leadership Institute, the ability to debug them through the awareness of quantum being or the possibilities “the unknown” produces impressive results.
Similarity Bias — We prefer what is like us over what is different:
This is how in-groups get formed a lot of the time, and later group-think syndrome sets in. The enormous opportunities in diversity elude us because we are so comfortable in our comfort zone due to this kind of bias. One needs a balanced view of people to learn and unlearn from unusual sources and people. This ability can create powerfully co-shared achievements without having to be best friends. This calls for decisive and people-relation skills as well as effective communication skills. There is so much creativity in relating to people who may share a different interest other than yours. We must strive to build synergies in school, workplace, social relations, etc. What are your tolerance and accommodating levels of people and contexts different from your usual comfort zone?
Expedience Bias — We prefer to act quickly rather than take time:
For some reason, speed mentality is frustrating a lot of people. There is a difference between patience and foot-dragging, waiting, and lazing about. Speed can eliminate details that create authenticity, durability, and value often. The most robust infrastructure pays more attention to process than speed because details and safety are paramount. The race is not for the swift, the fastest man on earth now Usain Bolt trained for hours before the moment of the dash.
Experience Bias — We take our perception to be the objective truth:
In art class, during a still-life drawing exercise, an object is placed in the middle, and everyone is asked to draw from where they sit and from what they see. Due to sitting position and distance, we will all draw and shade from different angles and perspectives. Each one’s works becomes their objective truth. But to have the exact image, a 3-D must occur, meaning we would need to dexterically closely knit everyone piece together.
This does not suggest where your sit was wrong, but it indicates that in the experiences of life, your point does not always mean you are absolutely right. This is one means to learn how to listen to others before drawing the line. It also suggests that no similar situation is the same, and not all past experiences can be used to solve a similar problem in the current or moment.
Experience bias has caused many people to miss out on great loving relationships and inspiring corporate careers. Experience can burden us with deep, painful memories and emotions, which become blockades to exploring new waters. No woman or man is the same, no opportunity is the same, no boss is the same, etc. The contrary cliché has stolen great opportunities from people. Being open to a fresh start does not mean you have no lessons; we learn to fail forward.
Distance Bias — We prefer what’s closer over what’s farther away: Proximity bias blinds us from possibility thinking and focusing. Traveling, the experts say it is part of quality education. Still, the lesson is in the journey we make to the destination, people we meet, cultures we encounter, sites we see, the phobias to overcome, etc. Embodying a mindset of going the distance breeds resilience, stamina, and sustainability.
Safety Bias — We protect against loss more than we seek out gain:
Such bias creates shackles that impede us from moving forward, and it deems our moderate risk prowess. We focus on losses and lose sight of gains. When we analyze everything from the point of what one will lose than gain because the terrain is unknown, this bias stifles creativity, innovation, and initiatives. It curtails your drive to try something new.
What is your focus on life, career, development?
I mostly share with my coachees that the value of the one-dollar bill is not in the note (printed paper), but the value America embodies as a nation. Be willing to unleash your potentials and abilities within a set context than being limited by systemic setups.
Farmers don’t consider sawing grains or seeds as a loss, rather than venture with the harvest gain in mind, till the land, burn, irrigate, weed around, etc., until harvest time. If you fear the unknown, you won’t release your potential to explore.
In conclusion, an impactful, legacy-driven, and fulfilled life is not accidental. Instead, through personal development investment, a conscious event is triggered through awareness creation, possibility, optimist-mindedness, opportunity tabbing abilities, courting healthy relationships, etc. This year be deliberate and purposeful to sign up with an experienced and professional coach who can co-create the space for the shift into the broader and more profound dimension of your potentials
Someone who can hold you accountable and responsible for your pragmatic hopes and aspiration to see you achieve them. Explore the benefits of allyship and mentoring where the need be also to augment your growth in your career path. In a nutshell, simplify your goals, make them somewhat stretchy, don’t overload or overwork your brain, and create inspiring mental pictures of the desired goals outcome
Transformational Coach| Certified Professional Corporate Trainer | Lead Consult for Zoweh Global Consult.
Email: [email protected] | Cell: (+233) 243-085-932
