Emerging Brilliance » plan

Trees and Dreams

nancy.montier — Fri, 10 Sep 2010 23:17:05 +0000

Forty years ago, my brother dug up tree seedlings in the forests or yards around us, rescued a catalpa tree from the bulldozers, and started some from seeds or acorns. He planted them in our yard. About a dozen grew up, so now, forty years later those trees are a foot or more in diameter and taller than the house- oaks, hickory, catalpa, maple, walnut. It’s like living in a forest. The sound of the wind riffling through the tops of the trees is a joy to hear when cooking or having a meal.

The learning - each tree has an internal intention to become itself – to gather the nutrients, materials, water and light; to follow its own DNA patterns, and develop trunk, branches and leaves characteristic of its species. It also grows into a unique tree in shape, height, location, etc. All the trees did that together, so now we’ve got a beautiful forest.

Our goals and dreams have their own internal DNA. The dream or goal, once stated or planted, gathers the resources, time and energy it needs to grow into itself. If you state that your desire is to own a blue hybrid car, you don’t start looking at trucks or bicycles. You don’t save $100. You save or plan on $30,000 and you look at blue hybrids. The dream contains the DNA, the blueprint for action.

So I invite you to plant your dreams, especially the ones that will be the biggest and brightest of your forest of dreams, and let them direct your actions, so your realized dreams grow into a beautiful, fulfilling life.

Mini Coaching Session:

Look over your forest of dreams you’ve created so far in your life. What do you love about it? What’s wanting to happen now? What dreams have you avoided planting? What are the conditions that will be more inviting for a beginning? Choose a dream and plant it, and discover what its DNA guides you and others to do to make it grow.

Creative Freedom

nancy.montier — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 19:41:34 +0000

This is it! You’re on stage, in your life, and your storyline is unfolding. You have creative freedom in every aspect of your story. You say yes or no, you love or you withdraw, you take the risk or not, you win and learn or you “lose” and learn. Lose is just a label for an unexpected or undesired result. No big deal. Puff out your chest! Breathe deeply and fill every cell with fresh air. Yes, you have built in “restrictions” like a short body or blind eyes or being male or female, or you name one of thousands of props, costumes that you have to work with. Oh, but what a story you can write around and because of the props and costumes and body you have to work with.

Wake up every day with a new chapter to write, and let your imagination romp ahead of you into the day – to set the stage. Is it a gloomy scene? Then really have at it. Is it sentimental? Who are you being in your story? Who do you admire? Then be them today. Experiment – what scenes bring you the most joy? What scenes do you avoid or have fear around scripting? If there is something in them for you then find the coach to work with you.!

The world needs you to be as big as you can be and to write the biggest life story your heart will hold and to love it all as it unfolds. It needs your brilliance. Thank you for being on stage!

You Gotta Have a Plan

nancy.montier — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 14:10:41 +0000

The anniversary of the moon landing reminded me of the anniversary of a life-changing journey I created. Twenty five years ago this summer I was riding my bicycle solo across the United States. I was in Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks on 7/24/84 sharing two lane roads with gigantic motor homes – worse than the east coast traffic!

One of my big aha’s this week as I remembered this bike trip with a coach, is that I had a plan for the trip. It was simple. Every day I got up and pedaled at least 60 miles down a very clear path – the road – unless it was dangerously hot or pouring down rain. The road took me east every day. Not north, south or west. East towards Boston and the Atlantic Ocean. As long as I followed the road, and kept safety precautions, I would get to Boston, to Deborah D.s house – my best friend from high school. Now, the problem with me in my business is that I keep changing plans. I change marketing plans, I change my goals, I change niches. I doubt my vision. I worry about money. I take exits off the road to visit giant balls of string and two headed snakes. I wander north and south and wonder why I’m no closer to Boston.

The road and my goal focused all of my energies. It kept me true and on task. Sure, I never saw the two headed snake, but I reached Boston, I accomplished my goal.

Action

Take stock of your plan. What is it to honor it? What are your two-headed snake detours? What are three changes you’ll make to your plan or how you honor it? I invite you to respond in the comments. Thank you for the courage to invent yourself everyday into your greatness.

Clean Slate

nancy.montier — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 23:23:14 +0000

Do you realize you can declare that you have a clean slate at the beginning of the second half of the year? I just worked on my 3rd quarter plan on Eric Lofholm’s sales protege call. We’re at the beginning of the quarter. It’s time to start fresh with the second half of the year. You may have done everything in your plan, or you may have veered off most of the time. Give yourself permission to start with a clean slate. Complete and let go of what you did or did not do up till now. No amount of thinking, regretting, celebrating or sadness will make the future any better. Just shake it like a tree, get all the apples out of it that you can to take with you into the future. Those apples are the gifts of learning from the past six months.
Complete the past 6 months. Use a ritual, declaration, celebration dinner, or whatever it takes. Then breathe and let yourself become aware of what wants to be created next.

The next step is to assess where you are and picture where you want to be at the end of the time frame. Do you want to be joyfully employed? Making another $10,000 or $100,000? Three sizes smaller? Then work backwards. Who do you have to be to achieve those goals? What will you learn? What results will you produce in July, Aug and September? Each week? What will motivate you? How will you handle breakdowns this time? How will you keep your goals fresh in your mind?

Finally, make a plan. Make it as detailed or general as you need to be successful. For me, great detail just makes me crazy. I like broad brush strokes. For others, details are it. The plan isn’t over until it’s on your calendar.

“Good business leaders create a vision, articulate the vision, passionately own the vision, and relentlessly drive it to completion”. Thomas Hardy

Leave a comment – Did you declare a clean slate? What is your planning process?