(Photo courtesy of kadajawi)
"The harder I practice, the luckier I get."
Steve Davis, Snooker Champion
I was talking to someone recently who said "I'd like to have some coaching clients. I don't have any yet, but I'm sure it'll happen".
I've heard this form of language over and over again over the years. My experience is that there are certain things that "happen" (Eg. Rust, the changing seasons, rainfall in the UK), and there are other things that get created (Eg. Cathedrals, six-packs, successful coaching practices). It seems to me that a lot of people have the magical misunderstanding that things in the "create" box (Eg. growing your client base) will be found in the "happen" box (Eg. it's raining this afternoon). This is the essence of passivity.
All the people I know who have successful coaching practices have taken action to grow their client-base. It didn’t just happen. They took action to create it. While there’s certainly a place for allowing things to “just happen”, I often see people using that “approach” as an alternative to doing the thing they know is right for them, but that they feel afraid to do. The phrase "It'll happen if it's meant to happen" is effectively meaningless; an affirmation of the kind of happy-horseshit that has people be a spectator in their own lives.
Why is this? It’s a grounding issue. The person mistakenly believes that their feelings of fear / anxiety / self-doubt are telling them about themselves and the thing they’re afraid to do. But it doesn’t work that way. We’re always living in the feeling of the principle of Thought taking form in the moment. The mistaken belief that we’re feeling something other than our thinking is the biggest cause of the problems we face as individuals, organisations and as a species.
People sometimes struggle to find the balance between "making things happen" and "letting things happen", but here's how I see it: To me there's a big difference between action, and the feeling BEHIND the action. For instance, I can be in the flow of life / guided by wisdom and taking massive action. Alternatively, I can be passive / inactive but completely caught up in insecure thinking. There's no causal connection between action and how in/out of flow a person is. It's all about "where you're coming from".
As my grounding continues to increase, there are all kinds of wonderful things that fall into place. Some of them look a lot like luck, serendipity & coincidence, & I love it. However, I'm reminded of Steve Davis' response when one of his stunning 147 breaks appeared to include moments of luck and good fortune. "The harder I practice, the luckier I get."
If you want to profoundly deepen your grounding and start creating what matters to you, you can join me at the "Making Your Living From The Inside Out" event on June 7-8 in London, or via live-streaming from wherever you are. There are only 3 seats left as I write! Details here: www.JamieSmart.com/awake
I look forward to connecting with you soon!
To your increasing clarity,
Best
Jamie
Comments
Maybe sometime in the future the weathermen will be saying: "On request of many farmers, the Meteorology Institute is going to make some rain tomorrow". But I don't believe that a building or machine will ever happen. 😉
Seriously, sometimes the "magical misunderstanding" you're talking about becomes a philosophy of the people who don't know what to DO to MAKE things happen. If someone practices and practices, but still doesn't get to the team, they may start thinking it's a matter of good/bad luck (which's still better than more dangerous belief "It's a matter of plot"). Who finds all his/her actions ineffective or hardly effective, gradually becomes less and less motivated, then less and less active, and starts to wait for "somethintg to happen". That's from my experience.