The Importance of Activating Your Vision

Many years ago on a cold winter day, I drove down the road with a million thoughts in my head. I questioned if I was on the right path in starting a business and writing a book.

Within a split second though, my thoughts scattered. That was all the time I had to react when I suddenly realized that an object was hurtling with lightning speed straight toward my windshield. I instinctively crossed by arms in front of my face waiting for the pain.

While protecting my eyes, my other senses took over. I heard a whooshing sound and metal dinging around in the front seat of my car but, surprisingly, not the pain I anticipated.

I forced one eye open, took the wheel again, only to view a shattered windshield and a four-foot, five pound metal bar stretching from my dash board to the passenger’s seat.

I was unhurt but the car was not so lucky. This tire iron incident is not unlike navigating your business.

One day you’re working the next you’re thrown a tire iron and it sidelines your momentum. Often times, just one event sidelines you and absorbs all of your energy.

This is the very moment where having a grounding framework comes in handy. This grounding framework can save you and your team from spiraling off on a tangent.

A vital competency of successful leadership is the ability to visualize, articulate and engage others in a desired future of any organization. Most business leaders, however, miss the vital next step. Creating and slapping a vision on the wall is what happens in most organizations.

The trick to sustaining a vision is to keep it alive each and every day. If it is not kept alive, it takes a back seat to the events of the day.

People who commit to living their vision realize that they must change their actions in order to live in alignment with it. They absorb their vision at a level where it keeps them on track.

When you take action consistent with your vision, your actions have a magnificent positive trickle effect. You begin to powerfully choose your next action intentionally in alignment with the vision versus the problem of the day.

Implementing the vision is a process. Once implemented, you will find that you and your team have another tool in their toolbox. Because you and your team focus on your future vision, which encapsulates your values in action, you will start to focus on possible alternatives versus what is not going right.

Creating a vision is one thing. Activating your vision every day is another.

It’s a choice. Choose powerfully.

P.S. An exercise to create your vision is available in the book, Me, Myself, and Why? The Secrets to Navigating Change by Lisa Mininni. To purchase copies for your team, CLICK HERE or for group purchases, visit http://excellerateassociates.com/me-myself-and-why/