Bring More of “YOU” to your Work

Posted on 08. May, 2010 by Natalie in Entrepreneurs, Featured, Inspiration & Motivation

This is the second guest post from Tess Denton on using Vision Boards for your business.

Happy spring! Last month, I introduced you to some exercises that are drawn from Destiny Rising and my “Building a Powerful Vision Board workshop”.

To recap, these exercises were:

Exercise 1: Look straight ahead.

I asked you to list twenty items, relationships and situations that you’d like to have in your business life.

Exercise 2: Squeaky Clean Intentions.

You scrubbed your list of any negative phrasing it may have contained. For example, if an item on your list read: “no more dead-end client prospects”, I asked you to make that statement a positive intention, such as:  “ample client contracts with projects that pay in 30 days”.

Since last month’s post, I hope that you have had a chance to gain additional clarity around your intentions. If you’re just joining the blog, jump in. Simply complete Exercises 1 and 2 above and come with us to the next step.

You spend more than a third of your life at work, so be sure that you are including the ideas and aspirations of your authentic self in your work life.

In fact, it may be like adding another valuable member to your team. The purpose of this month’s exercises is to reacquaint yourself with a younger “you” and to see how present he/she is in your life.

Since it’s springtime, let’s engage in springtime activities from your childhood.

Vision Board Example

Exercise 1:

Put your list of twenty items you’d like to have in your business life (from last month) into your pocket. Grab a Popsicle or a glass of Kool-Aid.

If you are still living in the locale where you spent your childhood, go back to your old neighborhood, and walk the path you used to take to your favorite park, or walk the route you used to take to your ballet class or baseball practice or kindergarten or Brownies or Cub Scouts or the swimming pool.

You probably dreamed about your future on this path for some or all of your childhood. If you’d rather walk a neighborhood in the city where you live now, that’s great too.

Spend 45 minutes to an hour by yourself waking up good memories. Let your mind wander while you savor your Popsicle or develop a Kool-aid moustache. Let the cloak of adulthood slip away.

Exercise 2:

Take your list of twenty items out of your pocket and consider it in light of your childhood dreams. Ask yourself two questions:

• Are there elements of what I’d hoped to have in my life when I was young on my list? If so, which items are they? If not, do they need to be added?
• Is my professional path in sync with the interests and passion I had when I was younger?

When I remember to reconnect with the young and fresh version of myself, excitement and possibilities appear in my work. Truth be known, I get bored by being “all business”.

I’m happiest when I employ more “recess” in my workday. That’s why I love my work in the area of vision boards and vision processes. Here, I get to use my creative and business experience in working with individuals and teams.

To give you a peek into the way in my connection with vision and possibility came to be, join me in my childhood laboratory for creativity. I grew up outside of Chicago, in a house built sometime around 1940.

At the end of our driveway was my laboratory – A one car detached white wooden garage with no door. The garage was so packed with the things we needed to live life that no car could fit in it. In this setting, all manner of make-believe occurred.

Rarely was the garage simply a garage. The garage became a house, a farmhouse, a school, a dime store, an office, a theater, a grocery store, a doctor’s office, a hospital, an airport, a train station and on and on.

Throughout my childhood, for our family and everyone in the neighborhood, our garage really was all of these things.  In my mind, I really was a doctor, a principal, a checker, a farmer, a mother, a patient, an actor, a flight attendant, etc. From 1962 – 1980 the garage served as an imaginarium.

If you enjoy the exercises I’m sharing each month, I encourage you to find a vision board seminar or workshop in your area. You’ll have an all-day pass that allows you to be, do and have anything you want.

• The Fine Art of Limiting Yourself to the Essentials in Work and in Life
• Build A Big Bright Vision For Your Future
• Defining Your Business Personality

Tags: achievement, Business Coaching, Destiny Rising, dreams, Entrepreneurs, passion, taking action, women in business