Simon T Bailey’s Blog

I had lunch with Gloria, a friend of mine who is the living embodiment of brilliant creativity. During our conversation I sensed that she was living beneath her potential, i.e., “playing small.” You are probably wondering if it was something she said that gave it away. No — what piqued my curiosity was what I heard between the lines. There was very little energy in her voice about her current professional position. It was almost as if she was stuck in neutral at a green stop light. I asked her what she would do if she knew that she couldn’t fail. All of a sudden, she lit up like a Christmas tree, became very animated and began to describe all of the wonderful things that she enjoyed doing. Then our conversation shifted to what would be required in order for her to pursue her passions/core competency. We identified that she would need to rise an hour earlier each day, eat properly, schedule two hours of quiet time (one hour in the morning and one hour in the evening), research online her diverse areas of interests and then put feelers out in the marketplace. Furthermore, she would have to adjust her attitude in her current professional position if she intended to get unstuck. In business as it is in life there are only two things that you do…enter and leave. How you enter determines how you leave, and how you leave determines how you enter. Shift out of neutral and go for it.

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