Hello everyone, and good Monday morning! Hope you had another great weekend and are ready for the week ahead. To give you a quick update, the Coins for Cancer Drive continues to flow exceptionally well. We had a dance at PWC on Friday night and Monday (today) we are having a second Blue Yellow Game, which is a basketball game involving all three Challenge schools. The spirit around each of the Coins events has been great and it’s something that has lots of opportunity for adjustments. We are about to begin the process of doing something familiar, as I am about to begin the process of doing something RealTime Cancer. Up to this point it’s been all “create” as everything has been new, which is great and exciting, but now we get to build on some of the original events. We are having our second annual golf tournament on June 20th, and I’ll begin the preparation for that very soon. Of course, there will be a whole new batch of challenges involved with building on previous event success, but those are challenges I welcome and am looking forward to tackling.
The Coins Drive has definitely taken it’s toll on me, as it has been a very busy several weeks, and I will not do this next year with out much more help. It would not have been pulled off without the help of many many people, especially my dad who’s been bailing me out left and right. I do still have that tendency to bite off more than I can chew… always learning!!
No more news, but a reminder that the Victory party is less than three weeks away. Hope you have booked the date off: Friday, April 13th (yes, Good Friday). I’ll be expecting to see most all of you!! Here’s today’s message, two of my favourite words.
Focus and Commitment
My last few messages have addressed lessons involving going inside, the importance of balance and the presence of choice in our lives. I feel a natural next step is to share my thoughts about focus and commitment. Once you have checked with your gut, decided where your priorities are and chosen a course of action, I believe focus and commitment continues the process nicely.
Setting goals, whether in your head or in a structured plan, allows you to think forward, at least it allows me to think forward, and I have always been a fan of having a rough idea of where I am going, and how I am getting there. A great example of that was the development of my strategy to tackle my cancer challenge. My hockey analogy helped me to visualize my battle, and it gave me a mindset to travel the road ahead. Yes I had no true idea of what lay ahead of me on that road, but what I did know was how I would tackle the unknowns that lay ahead of me. I have always been a big fan of focusing on what I control, and I always control my reaction to the unknown, the obstacles, the challenges. (A possible exception being drug involvement and the games it played with my mind, but even then I can say that I still tackled my challenges with the same core beliefs and attitude.)
I have always felt that by focusing on the parts of life that I could control I was in a more powerful position to influence the outcome of my experiences. And I would much rather have me be responsible for the outcomes of my experiences than anything else. Defining the “outcomes” of any experience is a personal thing and I feel it does often relate directly to your personal perspective of that experience. Once you can get the focus down all that’s left is the commitment to your goal. In November ‘98 my focus was developed quickly, and while it continued to evolve the core that I started with is still very much intact. If you have heard me speak I have most definitely talked about the two major commitments I made to myself during my first week in hospital.
The first commitment I made to myself was that I would fight for my life with everything I had. If I was to fight a cancer fight I would do it with all the heart, determination and love that was in my life. The second commitment was a commitment that is a growing part of my life, that was a commitment to share. As you all know I chose to share my experience with any and all interested to share it with me. Initially that was in this email group. As I have progressed I have begun to share my experience in other forums, in other mediums and with other audiences.
When talking about business or organizational strategy I often say that once you have the concept down, once you have developed a sound strategy, once you have your focus, all that stands between you and success is work, effort, commitment. I firmly believe that we all CAN accomplish anything we want, if we develop our goal and strategies through a sound process, our focus and commitment to the strategy will the determinant of our success.
I am an opportunity-oriented person, meaning when I see opportunity I have a tendency to want to take advantage of it. This tendency of mine makes focusing a challenge for me sometimes, but I have found that if I make the effort to focus, the commitment follows without hesitation and the success is a great gift.
Whatever you want, personally or professionally, you CAN have. Focus and commit to your goals and you’ll attain them.
Always…
Live Life. Love Life.
Geoff
