Clarity while flying to HTG in Orlando

Isn’t it just amazing the insight a person can have when travelling and having time alone with your own thoughts.

Today, many of my peers in the technology business are travelling to or have already made it to Orlando, Florida for our HTG Q4 meetings. I will be joining a number of people who I look up to in the technology business for guidance, direction and fellowship. These people are very instrumental to helping me with the direction, choices and decisions I make in my career, livelihood and family. I said they are instrumental; however I am responsible for the actions and the decision.

These leaders help me, offer insight and guidance to the decisions I make as a business person in the technology industry and how I interact with the clients we serve throughout Red Deer, Calgary and all of Alberta. The question I find myself re- playing over and over as I soar over the skies enroute to Orlando (MCO) today is, who is responsible and accountable for what happens at the business, home and with those I choose to associate with?

More importantly I am responsible for the results of my decisions and actions.

I am reading an old book from my bookshelf, one which has been sitting on the shelf for a while. I have no idea how it got there, but the fact is this, it was there and deserves to be read – it is amazing how the right book just screams at you to be read. The author is someone who is a very common voice and face on television, Dr. Phil McGraw. His book is “Life Strategies”. In this book, Dr. Phil speaks about strategies for our own life, some of these strategies are pretty obvious and some well not so obvious.

I am only into the third chapter and need to take a break to record my thoughts so far. Dr. Phil has discussed with me, personally through his book two strategies. The first is “either you get it, or you don’t” and the second is “you create your own experience”.

Two very powerful observations about life in my opinion.

Either you get it or you don’t. Well I see this everywhere I go. Networking, business relationships, home relationships, dealing with challenges, running a mile…sometimes I get it and then sometimes I don’t. I would like to think when it comes to my career, I get it. I think I have a good grip on what it takes to be a success in the Calgary IT market, sometimes I elect not to practice what I know but at least I get it.

The second lesson is “I create my own experience”. I am accountable for how I deal with things or how I elect to react to an event. More important I am accountable for the outcomes which occur. I am responsible for electing to carry on an email thread instead of stopping it and just talking to the other person on the phone. I am responsible for how I respond to people and their sarcasm. No one else but me, myself and I. I am responsible for the outcomes which occur to me in my life.

You see it is too easy to blame another person or to play the victim. It is too easy to blame the recession instead of going out and taking ownership for what occurs when we elect not to take action and sit in our office and think about all the bad things which have happen. We create our own experience and we are responsible for the outcomes. ALWAYS!

I just love the clarity which happens when you take time to be with your own truths and understand yourself better.