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Welcome to Elements
This edition is dedicated to K for "Keeping On." Where do you need to keep on going, despite obstacles? Keeping on represents the determination, perseverance and movement toward something that is not yet clearly visible, not believed to be completely possible right now. Keeping On is not always easy and can sometimes be viewed as slightly ridiculous, or as failure. There are many reasons to stop trying, to not keep on going. What keeps a person moving on, over, or through a barrier is different and very personal for everyone. Inspiration, insight, tips and tools can be found in many ways and I hope you may find at least one that resonates for you in this edition of Elements.
Bottom line for achieving goals: Your only choices are to stop, to pause, or to keep on going. Any of these may be the right or necessary thing to do at different stages of your journey towards a goal. Sometimes you need to refresh your commitment to a goal. What is it that you are pursuing and why? What choices do you have at this point, and which one will you choose? For clarity, while reading this, think of "it" as a specific goal or project or path or mission that you are on. For example it could be to learn a new set of skills, find a new career, or complete a project or identify a larger life mission or vision. Rarely is our path to a goal as smooth as going from A to B.
Keep on reading, and find out how others keep on keeping on!
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What is it that successful people have in common that keeps them going? Based on my experience and readings, I'm going to declare these as patterns: Practice, Beliefs about failure, and Authentic inner inspiration and drive
1- Practice
What do Bill Gates and the Beatles have in common, other than being successful cultural icons and both having names starting with the letter "B"? They were masters at what they did. As presented in Malcolm Gladwell's book, The Outliers, part of their success is due to what he calls, "The 10,000-Hour Rule." This rule says that to become a master at something you must have put in at least 10,000 hours with it. There are many people who are good at what they do, but it requires practice and experience to become a master. Gladwell tells the story of how Bill and the Beatles put in their 10,000 hours. They did it over and over, they practiced, and they kept doing it. This rule applies to athletes, composers, actors and others who have developed expertise in their field.
2- Beliefs about Failure and Change
Stories abound about how people failed before they achieved success. What successful people have in common is that they are not afraid to fail, and that they are actually comfortable with even significant interim failure. They truly believe and act as if each failure is a new piece of information to learn from and to apply towards appropriate changes for improvement. Tiger Woods and Michael Jordan are two examples. Their own words about failure are the most powerful to read:
"If you're not afraid of failure, you're going to succeed. Because along the way you're going to have your successes. But you're going to have a lot more failures, and learn from your failures. It's OK to fail. If I fail I'm going to pick myself up and come back and win the next one, because I failed. In most other sports you have a higher win percentage than failure rate. In golf it's the exact opposite. You lose ALL the time, and it's very rare that you do win, and when you do win it's like the biggest emotion you could possibly have in the sport, because you don't win very often. In that respect golf is very much a microcosm of life, you have to deal with a lot more failures in order to succeed." Tiger Woods
"I've missed more than 9,000 shots in my career; I've lost almost 300 games. Twenty six times I've been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I've failed over and over and over in my life. And that's why I succeed!" - Michael Jordan
3 - Inner Inspiration and Drive
Those who stay the course and keep going through difficult and challenging times will say and believe that they had no choice but to go on. When unsure or challenged, it's that strong inner belief in the rightness or necessity of what they are doing, accessed regularly, that keeps them going. These beliefs are sometime spiritual, sometimes based on a person's sense of justice and fairness, and sometimes they are reported as an inner imperative or drive, an intuitive and strong need to move in a certain direction. This inner inspiration can create a focus or direction, and it may not always be clear exactly how it will take them where they want to go. But they follow it - and many eventually succeed.
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Choice: Stop, Pause or Get Clarity
 Keeping on does not mean doing the same thing over and expecting different results, which is the definition of insanity! Keeping on does not mean that everyone will agree with your goal and support you as you try to make your way. If you don't want to keep on, the only other choices are for you to Stop or Pause.
Stopping
Knowing when to stop pursuing a goal is equally as important as keeping on. Stopping can take as much courage as staying the course. What gets in the way of stopping can be stubbornness, ego, pride, tunnel vision, boredom or just an ultimate unwillingness to undergo the discomfort of change. Change can also entail uncertainty, and being in a state of uncertainty is difficult for some.
Pausing
Sometimes, pausing or putting the goal on hold is the wisest choice. This time of pause can be approached in a few different ways. Two of these ways can be letting a goal go for a short and predetermined amount of time and then resuming it, or by examining the goal and reevaluating it altogether. Pausing can be a time to re-assess and get re-inspired. This can be a time to tap into what inner beliefs you have that are meaningful for your goal, to refresh yourself with the energy of what you are passionionate about, or to revisit the place in you where there is no choice for you to make but to keep on.
Getting Clarity for Keeping on
What inspires you to keep going?
Who inspires you?
How can you incorporate your inspiration into everyday life?
What activities energize you and keep you going?
What thoughts keep you going?
What beliefs about yourself or your world or your goal are motivating and help keep you going?
Now turn the questions around - what doesn't inspire you? What drains your energy, what stops you from wanting to continue towards your goal?
Having these two camps in clear view can be very helpful when assessing your willingness to continue with a goal.
I'd love to hear your thoughts and ideas about what keeps you keeping on.
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Never give up, for that is just the place and time that the tide will turn. Harriet Beecher Stowe
Do the thing you fear to do and keep on doing it. That is the quickest and surest way ever yet discovered to conquer fear. Dale Carnegie
Fall down seven times, get up eight. Japanese Proverb
I do the very best I know how, the very best I can, and I mean to keep on doing so until the end. Abraham Lincoln
Keep on beginning and failing. Each time you fail, start all over again and you will grow stronger until you have accomplished a purpose - not the one you began with perhaps, but one you'll be glad to remember. Annie Sullivan
Keep on going and the chances are you will stumble on something, perhaps when you are least expecting it. I have never heard of anyone stumbling on something sitting down. Charles Kettering
Keep on Trucking. Robert Crumb, cartoonist, from the Blind Boy Fuller song "Truckin' My Blues Away"
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Elements
Change is inevitable; one thing that is guaranteed is that change will happen. Successful people keep on moving through change. They embrace and create change. Being good at change is actually a skill that can be learned. In this training, we will examine the different natural styles that people have towards change, take a look at changes you may be experiencing (or anticipating, dreading, or avoiding), and then learn some tools and techniques for how to better manage them. How individuals and teams notice and react to change will impact personal and team productivity and results. Being aware of the different reactions to change, and how to ease yourself and others through it, helps with bottom-line results. There are a variety of tools and hands-on exercises taught in this course. The course is available in either a one-hour interactive talk or a three-hour workshop. Contact me for more information or to schedule a change workshop.