Keep The Focus On Your Destination
During the pandemic of 2020, I’d sometimes find myself tired of being STUCK inside the four walls of my house. I love my wife and our two crumbsnatchers, but I sometimes just needed time alone.
Thinking back — Can you relate in that season to just wanting to be free?
So I’d jump in my car and just drive. Didn’t matter the direction and I had no intended place to go. I just wanted to be out the house. Eventually, I’d make it back home in a couple hours and feel so much better.
Unfortunately though, too many of us are treating our day to day lives like this. We wake up and we hop into whatever the day requires of us (not what we require of it), without direction and no clear destination. We do what we must and we’re often at the end of the day no further toward an intended goal than when the day began.
I believe the great majority of people today suffer from a lack of clarity in their vision, their goals and their intended ‘destination’.
There are some who might have set a long term goal, but then life hits hard (and it’ll do that to us all at some point) and we give up and we head ‘home’.
What if we looked at our vision and goals like a navigation system?
Imagine if you were going to drive from New York to Florida. You wouldn’t just jump in your car and drive. You’d get your Google Maps app open and put in your intended destination right?
Now you have clarity on the best route to get you through your journey.
But here’s the thing, somewhere along this trip (like in life) you’ll have an accident along the path that creates a slow down or all together stops you on your journey. It can sometimes lead Google Maps to reroute you and offer to take you on a different path. That alternate route will most likely take you in a new direction and it most likely adds time to the trip. But in the end, you get around the issue and you keep it moving towards your destination.
In the same way, life will have its unplanned road blocks and challenges. And when those come about, DON’T QUIT!
Instead I want you to learn to SHIFT. Seek out your alternate path around the obstruction in your way. Yes, it might change your direction. Yes, it might add significant time to your journey to get where you’re trying to go. But you’ll get there if you don’t give up.
Here are two important takeaways:
1. Get clarity on where you want your life to end up. Get clear on your long term vision and your goals (what I call your BHAGs — Big Hairy Audacious Goals). When you’re clear on those, you can begin to reverse engineer your path to get to your intended destination.
2. When you’re met with those unplanned challenges and issues along the journey, seek out the alternate paths and ways around those obstacles. Know that it’s ok to pull off the road and take a break (mental or physical or both). It’s ok to take an alternate path that might extend your time to achieve your goal. But if your goal and that intended destination is still a priority for you over the long term, you’ll still arrive and achieve it if you keep moving.
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Stephen A. Hart — Brand Strategist and Podcaster, Isles Media LLC
I am the creator of Brand In Demand™, an online self-paced program geared at helping today’s leaders and entrepreneurs gain clarity on their purpose, vision, message and personal brand. In this post-pandemic economy, it’s so important that we as professionals are designing our online presence, and creating the impact, wealth, and legacy we hope to leave. Learn more at www.stephenahart.com
