THE SECRET QUESTION YOU NEED TO BE ASKING
I’ve been going to Devon most summers throughout my life. There is a massive sandbank that emerges on our local beach as the tides are changing, formed by different currents, waves and tides. It's extremely dramatic to watch as the big waves crash onto it from different directions. I wouldn’t want to be stranded on that sandbank!
If you walk along the cliffs and look down, you can see that this sandbank is actually pretty close to 3 landmasses nearby and that if you were stranded, you’d be perfectly safe. However, you would have to wait for the right time and make a choice as to which landmass was the easiest to swim to at that moment.
I feel this sandbank analogy is an appropriate metaphor for how things are with us at the moment. We are stranded at home, working at home, balancing homeschooling with work opportunities and commitments and we have little or no access to recreation or socialising. We are somewhat stranded on a sandbank with many different waves crashing into us from all directions.
From “Mummy, the internet won’t work”… “Dad, I can't get the printer to work”… “Can I have a snack”… to “What leads are you following up this week”… “Have you sent me that report yet”….“Come on guys, we need to find a new a creative solution” along with internal thoughts of “I must go for a walk, get fit, practise mindfulness”.
We are having to evolve fast. We are used to living with compartments such as my ‘work compartment,’ my ‘family weekend compartment’, my ‘work-out compartment,’ my ‘recreational and let off steam compartment’. It’s all been mashed together in a giant cake mix and oftentimes it’s coming out of the oven a bit of a mess because we haven’t had a chance to ensure key ingredients were included.
How can we get a clifftop perspective, look down and see the landmass options? What can we do to ensure we are keeping calm, focused and mentally able? The question we need to be asking that will bring simplification and productivity is, ‘What will make the most IMPACT this week?’. This question whittles down the white noise of the waves and suffocates the spray of distraction by making us take stock of what’s important and what’s not.
IMPACT?
Impact means ‘to have a marked effect or strong influence’. How can you have a strong influence this week?
Look at your to-do list and put a star by anything that is High Impact and will create the most positive effects.
If you want to connect with your kids but have little time, ask what will make the most impact. It’s not necessarily being around all the time, but perhaps playing a 10-minute game. That’s all. I played a game for 7 minutes this morning with one of my kids and the impact was strong. We laughed, we enjoyed one another's company and we both left feeling happy.
If you have a complex situation with a work colleague, ask yourself “What would make the most impact this week to help resolve this situation?”. Other questions you can ask are “What impact on our sales do I want my team to make this week?", "What impact can we make to improve our year-end accounts?", "What impact would going on a run have on my work today?”.
Asking the IMPACT question will enable you to have a clifftop perspective and see the land you need to get to. You will move from being stranded to being safe. You will be able to swim away from the waves of chaos into the land of greater clarity and focus.
A question to end…
What will you focus on today to create the most IMPACT?
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