My life seems to be one big preparation exercise. This speech coming up or that lesson needed to be presented. Something about being in front of an audience for a living has caused me to raise my game when it comes to being prepared. It can be a bit embarrassing to be standing in front of a few hundred people and not know what you are talking about. Trust me on that one!
My life wasn’t always this way. It used to be that I would look at my calendar and determine where I had to be next and then perform some sort of Cliff Notes info-cram exercise that would help me to “get through” the event. It could be a sales call when I was selling or it could be a conference call where I am expected to be knowledgeable about the topic. Whatever the case, I had perfected the art of getting by and appearing to know what I was talking about.
This all stems I think from the university system that many of us came up through. We were not encouraged to spend the time to really get to know something. We were encouraged by an exam-based system to wait until just before the test and then try to capture as much knowledge as you can for that “event”. Get past the event without being found out and you have done your job. You got the grade. You pulled the wool. Whew, glad that is over, now what’s next?
Preparation Meets Opportunity
As we make our way from the university into the workforce, we of course take our exam-driven performance model with us. The boss wants something presented at the next team meeting and we begin the process all over again. Where can I get the most information, in the fastest time possible, in a format that I can easily transfer to a presentation slide? What if we developed a different model? What if we developed a mindset of actually preparing for possible opportunities instead of waiting for opportunities to appear before we begin to get prepared? Revolutionary, I know.
“The secret of success in life is for a man to be ready for his opportunity when it comes.”
Benjamin Disraeli
Abraham Lincoln once said, “I will prepare and some day my chance will come.” And John Maxwell added, “If you wait for an opportunity to appear before you get prepared, it will be too late.” So, why do we wait to begin our preparations until the opportunity is knocking at the door? It is human nature to procrastinate and push things off until the last minute, that’s for sure. But I also think that there are some other factors at work:
- We aren’t sure what exactly we are to be preparing for – This was a big area for me. It was not until I made up my mind that I wanted to expand my horizons and begin to invest in my personal development that my eyes began to be opened to new opportunities. What I learned very quickly was that it doesn’t really matter “what” you are preparing for as long as you are developing and investing in you. The way this happened for me was when I became upset with myself that I had put on weight after injuring my knee and no longer being able to run 15-20 miles a week. As I was looking at how I had given up that exercise discipline I also noticed other disciplines I had let go. Reading was one of these disciplines that no longer existed. And the worst thing was when I asked myself why I did not exercise and read any longer the answer I gave myself was that I did not have the time for either. Argh!!! That is the worst possible excuse I could imagine for not doing something, especially something that would have tremendous benefits for me. The decision I made right then and there was that I needed to begin to pour into me so I could one day pour into others. You can’t give what you don’t have and at this point in my life I didn’t have much.
- We are not sure how exactly to begin to prepare – Once I determined that I needed to start pouring into me so I could pour into others I had to decide how I was going to do this. The calendar was already tight and I did not need to throw two more items on it. So, I looked into how could I exercise and read at the same time. Sounds funny, but I figured if I could do two things at once and get a benefit from both then that was a good investment of time. To begin I did what my children have taught me to do when you need an answer, Google it. What I found was a website where I could download books to my MP3 player. Once I had a book going in my ears I put my feet on a treadmill and wha-lah, I am now reading and exercising. Over time listening to books began to give me other ideas of skills I needed/wanted to develop. So I invested in some CD/DVD leadership programs and began to follow certain experts on Twitter and blog sites. This led to more books and lessons that led to me beginning developing my own thoughts and thus to write this blog. It has taken a couple of years, but in the time since I began developing me I have been able to complete over 50 books a year and I am now receiving a requests from both inside my work and outside my work to deliver speeches and lessons to help others in the area of leadership and personal development. Before I started all this there appeared to be no opportunities out there for me to pursue. Once I got going on me opportunities began to come out of the woodwork.
So What Changed?
That’s a good question; what changed to make all these new opportunities appear? Did the economy take a leap and now opportunities abound? Are you kidding? Did I just get “lucky” and someone thought they would give me a try? Hardly. Actually, what changed was me. If you want to provide more value to people then you need to become more valuable yourself. The investment I made in me and the decision to always be preparing are beginning to payoff. Jim Rohn liked to say, “If you keep doing what you always done then you will keep getting what you’ve always got”. That was truer in my life than I wanted to admit. If you want something different than you have today then something has to change. And that something is you.
Today matters. Your success in life is a result of your daily agenda. How will you spend today? Will you set aside some time to prepare yourself for tomorrow? But what if no opportunity comes my way you say. I personally believe that it is better to be prepared for an opportunity and not have one than to have an opportunity and not be prepared.
Question: How do you prepare yourself for the opportunities that will come your way?
