“Embracing your reality only serves to inhibit your ability to change it.” ~ Dave Cooke
“This is my reality” is a concept I hear a great deal about. Whether I am talking to sales professionals, business owners, parents, or individuals there is often a need to emphasize how much I need to know and understand their current situation. What I have discovered is that the more passionately someone goes to explain, clarify, defend, or return to their current reality, the more difficult it becomes for them to believe they can change it.
Where we are and what we are experiencing are incredible motivators for change. However, they need not be a measuring stick or a barometer for how hard or difficult that change is going to be.
What is most important in the process of change is not where you are, it is where you are going. Instead of fixating on the present, the focus and the effort must be on the new reality and the steps required to move toward it.
Focusing on the present is like pouring and then standing in cement. The more you do it, the more likely you are to get stuck there.
Brandon is in a wonderful spot in his life. He is actively practicing the art of focusing on the future. He has many hurdles that could easily obstruct his ability to move forward. Instead, he has been focusing on maintaining the steady, positive, incremental progress he has been making. He knows those challenges exist, yet he doesn’t let them worry him or distract him. When I ask him about them, he acknowledges they exist and I can hear the slight concern in his response; but, he reminds me and himself that he is not going to let that bother him right now. And, he maintains his focus and keeps on moving.
He knows that focusing the fears of his reality will only distract from his personal mission to keep moving and maintaining momentum.
We all have aspects of our lives that appear to have the power to block, stop, interrupt, or prevent change. This can only happen when we give those forces the power to do it. When we take control of the change we desire, our new reality becomes the change we desire and our current reality has no sway over us.
Instead of asking yourself “how can I change this situation?” ask yourself “can I change this situation?” If the answer is yes, the rest is found in the details of your commitment to change not in your fear of the present. Focus on where you are going and not where you are. The progress you make and the ideas you uncover in this mindset will move you to a new reality in ways you didn’t realize were previously possible.
