ACTION is the key to making something, perhaps something really big and important, happen.

When a director calls for ACTION, he’s nearly at the end of making happen whatever it is he’s trying to create.   Long before (sometimes for years) the ACTION call he had an idea, perhaps a dream or a vision, of what he wanted to create.   He (or she!) had to plan how to bring the idea to life, gather resources and support, envision the final product and practice how the idea would come to life before he ever commanded “ACTION!”

Yet for all the work and resources and envisioning, he would have nothing to show for it without the ACTION.

One of Dr. Phil’s Ten Life Laws, #5, is Life Rewards Action.   Those who dream of being an NBA basketball star or a US Figure Skating Champion have zero chance of achieving that dream if they don’t get off their butt and actually play basketball or skate.   It doesn’t matter how much dreaming, praying, wishing, hoping, planning, studying, or watching the greatest players or skaters of all time you do.  You must take ACTION.

ACTION certainly doesn’t guarantee success.  But as the great Hockey player Wayne Gretsky once said, “You miss 100% of the shots you never take.”

What ideas, hopes, and dreams are you holding close?   What are you willing to do to make those ideas, hopes, dreams come true?   All the preparation in the world won’t create the reality you envision.   You must take ACTION.

I dream that the phrase “Let’s think 2 steps ahead about that for a minute” becomes a common phrase in the human vocabulary.   To do that, the readership of this blog has to explode.   I must keep people checking back often, knowing they’ll get value from what is written here.   To create that value, I must faithfully write about interesting and important things far more often than I’ve been doing this past year.  I need to take more ACTION.

My ideas are many.  I’ve planned, I’ve hoped, I’ve dreamt, I’ve prayed and I’ve envisioned.   It’s time for more ACTION.

Will you help hold me accountable?   Please comment and encourage me if you feel led to do that.  And share, if you would, what you want to create with more ACTION in your own situation.

Honestly, no matter what day the calendar proclaims, every morning is a new opportunity.  The past is gone…finished…ready to lay to rest, good or bad.   The future is stretched out in front of me…a fresh, clean slate on which to write and create any dang thing I please.    But there’s something about January 1 that makes a much bigger impact than, say, July 26.

Last spring I wrote about 40 days of focus.  It wasn’t as successful as I’d hoped, but it wasn’t a total loss either.  When the 40 days were finished, I wrote a blog entry titled My Life is a Mess.  I promised to take control of my life again and check back in another 40 days.

Far more than 40 days have since passed, but I’ve accomplished much on the four goals I set out in the original Focus post.  I’ve lost nearly 50 pounds and feel better physically than I have in years.   (A book that had a Profound Impact on helping me lose that weight is Why We Get Fat, And What To Do About It by Gary Taubes.)   I rediscovered how much feeling better physically positively affects my mental state.  I’m optimistic, hopeful, energized and raring to see what comes next.

I did convert the Thinking 2 Steps Ahead website to a blog and am well into a writing routine.  Beginning this week (January 1, 2012) my working hours will be reduced by 20% so I’ll have one day a week to focus on writing.

I am jazzed about today, jazzed about tomorrow, and the day after that.   I invite you to share my journey this year as I finish the Thinking 2 Steps Ahead book, and develop other projects that help people be the best they can be.

Life is good.  Bring it on!

What new beginnings can you get excited about for 2012?   Share them here by commenting.

But I got a new perspective and understanding of just what that means recently when I picked up a book and read three chapters on wisdom, discernment and sound judgment.   Very short chapters, actually, but for me, very long on insight.

I always thought being wise meant smart, intelligent and able to give people good advice.  I
remember being asked in a job interview once if I considered myself smart.  I answered that I think there are two kinds of smart….book smart and common sense smart.
I think I have a good mix of both.   I’m not a super brainiac, but I am privileged to have two great parents who trained me to face life head on, to prosper and thrive by making good and effective decisions and choices.  Compared to many, I am, I think, smarter than average.

What I understood in a new way after reading the book is that wisdom is sometimes a gift one is born with, but that it can also be nurtured and developed.  Wisdom leads to
discernment and sound judgment.   And that discernment and sound judgment yield many tangible and intangible life benefits.  Wisdom can protect you from being taken advantage of, from being sucked in by people who don’t have your best interests in mind or who are downright evil.  Wisdom is what keeps you open to new ideas.    It helps drive away fear and cope with disaster.  Wisdom protects us from making bad choices.   Wisdom makes us discerning and able to make sound judgments which yield those aforementioned benefits.

Now, more than ever, I want to be remembered as being wise.

The book, by the way, is the Bible.  Proverbs, Chapters 2, 3 and 4.  Worth the read no matter what your religious persuasion.

First of all, there are no pain receptors in the brain so it’s impossible that their brain hurts simply trying to think of an answer to a question.

Second, they’re lying to themselves.   One of two things is really happening.   Either they know the answer to the question and they don’t want to admit it to themselves or to anyone else or they’re simply too lazy to use the brain that they have to THINK critically enough to give a reasonable answer.   Both situations are seriously detrimental to creating an effective life.   Choosing to not think because your brain “hurts” ensures that you’ll never “win.”

Unfortunately, our culture has accepts abdication of our responsibility to think.   We are worse off for it.   Students memorize answers for tests rather than learning to think through problems and come to conclusions.  We are bombarded with media opinions posing as news, trying to persuade to simply repeat to gain proponents for our side.   We read something sent via e-mail, believe it and pass it on without doing a reasonability or truth check on it.  We routinely repeat lies, half truths and exaggerations without consequence simply because we heard it somewhere.  We even look at and believe pictures and documents that have been electronically created that don’t represent truth at all.

To keep from being duped, we must think.   To learn to “win” in life, you cannot follow the crowd and simply accept everything others tell you or want you to believe.  Use the amazing brain God gave each human being to ask pointed questions about the truth, reasonability, motive, and righteousness of the information.

Take your power back!  Next time you get an e-mail that seems incredible check to see if it’s true before you pass it on.   When you discover that it’s not, you’ll feel smart, powerful and in control of your own thinking.   Isn’t it far better that you are in control of you?

What I discovered is that I can only focus for a few days and then it takes me about 40 days to recover and refocus.  

I’m sorely disappointed in myself.  

I work a day job, two day jobs actually…probably 50-60 hours a week depending on the time of year since I live in a vacation paradise.    When I come home from work, regardless of what time it is, I am exhausted.   Though I normally get at least 8 hours a night in bed, I don’t necessarily sleep 8 hours and I’m not rested more often than I am rested.   My feet hurt all the time, sometimes so much that they’re the main reason I don’t sleep well.   I don’t want to start relying on drugs, over the counter or otherwise, to sleep. 

In summary, part of my life, the body in which I spend 100% of my time, something I have control over, is a mess. 

And so, just as I would say to someone I’m coaching, I ask myself the question:  What are you going to do about it?

{5 day break in writing here….}

I read a book this week called Half Assed:  A Weight Loss Memoir by Jennette Fulda.  It’s not a how to book—more of a why I did it book.  Near the end she talked a lot about choices.   I really appreciated her insight and it moved me in ways I haven’t been moved in years.  She gets it and took control of her intended consequences.

I promise this blog will not become something I never intended it to be and that’s about me.  But I realize that for the terrific life I profess to have, my one great failure is my physical condition.   It’s just too hard for me to maximize intended consequences so I gave up a long time ago. 

I’m taking control of my body again, thinking (and acting) 2 steps ahead about how my life is affected by my physical condition.   I’ll check in again in another 40 days or so. 

What do you need to take control of today?  If it were easy it wouldn’t even be on the radar.  Comment and we can encourage each other.

I was accused last week of being a thief.   I ordered something on the internet.  The vendor offered me Net 30 terms without my asking for them.  The merchandise arrived, along with an invoice, but there was a HUGE gap in the quality of what I ordered and expected and what I received.   Instead of trying to resolve the problem, he actually called me a thief.   I tried to be reasonable, he called me names.   I refused to take the bait and fight with him.  

Today an on-going disagreement came to a head when one of our customers stood her ground about how to handle what she claims is a mistake.  Again, trying to be reasonable does not guarantee that reason will be returned.   The relationship could seriously be in jeopardy over this one situation. 

There IS conflict everywhere.  Before we wade into the fray, it’s important to think about what end result we want. 

My co-workers and I spent quite a bit of time in each of the situations described above discussing how to handle them to ensure we achieved the result we wanted. 

In the first case we knew we were right.  There was no downside to simply letting the vendor rant and rave and not engage him in the conflict.   We ordered the product from another vendor, are perfectly willing to return the product he sent and we haven’t paid him anything. 

The second case is trickier.   We want to protect the relationship with this customer, yet ensure that this situation doesn’t set a precedent that will ultimately make it untenable for us to work together.  So we need to take smart action that will ultimately lead to an amicable solution.   We chose to think carefully about our next “move” and examined all the ways the customer could react to what we do or say next.    

How do you handle the conflict in your day to day life?   Will your responses help or hurt your relationships?

The only conclusion I can draw is that there is no thinking (let alone thinking 2 steps ahead) in making a choice to squeeze as much good “feeling” out of a situation.

Feelings and emotions will muck up effective choices every time.  It’s important to learn to step back from a situation and try to make any choice associated with it when your feelings and emotions are not in control of your brain and your body.  This is not to say that feelings and emotions don’t play a role in decisions and choices.  They certainly do.  But they act kind of like drugs and alcohol and dull the ability to reason.  If you want to “win” be sure to make choices when you’re not completely under the influence of emotion and feelings.

I guarantee that more games of life are lost when the player makes choices based only on the extremely faulty premise of If It Feels Good, Do It.

What choices, decisions, actions, words, have you made based on feelings or emotion rather than what the consequences of what those words, actions or behavior would be?  

How did that work out for you?  What would you have done differently?

If thinking about what your “win” is seems overwhelming, choose one or two small things in your life that you don’t want to continue.  Make your “win” eliminating those things from your life.  A bit of success in doing those small things moves you closer to your win and give you hope, energy and enthusiasm for more winning. 

 Too often, folks have no idea that the way they THINK about something can yield a completely different result than they might otherwise have.  Ask yourself this:  How would I act and speak differently today if I thought differently about my daily routine? 

Instead of simply going to work, what would happen if you worked with the intention of adding value, contributing to the success of the organization and had fun while working?

Instead of simply going home to your family, how would your home life be different if you spoke and acted in ways that demonstrate to your family how important they are to you?

Instead of simply vegging out at the end of the day, what could you accomplish if you spent 30 minutes a day doing something that moves you closer to your life “win”?

I submit to you that little changes in attitude and action yield amazing results.   Let me know that works for you.

  “I wish someone had showed me this when I was younger.  My life would have been totally different.”

The concept of Thinking 2 Steps Ahead is nothing new.  In fact, many successful and effective people think 2 steps ahead all the time without ever being aware they are doing it.  Thinking 2 Steps Ahead simply puts a name on another one of the habits highly effective people use. 

Often, though, folks whose lives haven’t turned out, or definitely are not, quite the way they hoped or dreamed have “ahha!” moments during a Thinking 2 Steps Ahead workshop.  Almost everyone learns to play checkers as a child.  But few ever connect the dots that the thought process used to win a checkers game can also help make good life decisions.  A light bulb goes off for them because no one ever explained it to them quite like this before.

Self-help gurus talk about choices all the time.  Most people think about choices in a pretty black and white context: should I go to college? What job should I pursue? Who should I marry? Should I plan to have a child or behave in a way that risks an unplanned pregnancy?  These types of decisions set the direction for life.   But much smaller, day-to-day choices, determine whether you believe life is good every day.

One of the most amazing effects Thinking 2 Steps Ahead can have in creating a different life is relationship improvement. 

First–-always first—decided what outcome you want.  Using the game analogy, that outcome is the “win.”  Be honest.  Some relationships are worth saving, some are not.  Then, examine the things that are said and done within that relationship.  Are those things said and done moving closing to the “win” or not?  If not, why not?  If not, what must change to get back to a winning strategy?  Is the game worth winning?

Though you get to choose your “win” in your life, the rules are set when you get into the game.  Until you become an adult, parents get to set the rules; schools get to set your rules; society has rules; your employer has rules; and others in your personal relationships have rules.  You don’t necessarily have to like or agree with any rules set by everyone else in your life, but if your “win” represents anything from their world, their rules apply. 

Consequences are defined as something that logically or naturally follows an action or a condition.   You have no control over consequences, but you often do have control over the action or condition that leads to the consequence. 

It is true that sometimes stuff happens over which you have absolutely no control.  An example is the recent natural disasters all over the world.  What you do have control over is how you react to what happens to you.   Your attitude, your decisions, your words, your actions all determine whether you move closer to that “win” you defined.

When you don’t play by the rules it’s impossible to win the game.   You are rewarded for playing by the rules by being allowed to continue to play.  Breaking the rules results in penalties and set-backs.  Complete disregard of the rules can eject you from the game. 

What are your choices about the rules in your game of Life?  Do you recognize them?  Do you choose to play by them or do you rebel against and break them?  Bottom line?  Are you playing to win?