Best Year Yet

by Cindy Bostick, Certified Best Year Yet Partner

Do you remember the 2009 American romantic comedy and Golden Globe nominated movie titled, It’s Complicated with Meryl Streep (Jane), Alec Baldwin (Jake) and Steve Martin (Adam)?  In case you didn’t see it, the plot is that Jane and Jake have three grown children together and have been divorced ten years. Jane is single and has taken an interest in the contractor she hired to remodel her home and Jake is married to the woman he cheated on Jane with.

Jane and Jake begin an affair while attending their son’s college graduation in New York and the affair continues when they return home to Santa Barbara, California. Their children are not happy with Mom and Dad’s relationship because they hadn’t yet gotten over the divorce. Adam spots Jake naked in Jane’s bedroom via a webcam and breaks their relationship off…

Now that’s complicated!

When I think of something being complicated, these words come to mind – difficult; not easily understood or untangled; confusing.

I am reminded of a coaching session with a client not long ago.  She wanted to focus our session on an internal struggle she was having around leaving a business she built, loved, and made a very good living at.  She was healthy but she was also tired of the stress associated with the work. However, fear of leaving what was comfortable for “retirement” gripped her.

She was making this transition more complicated than it needed to be because she didn’t have a clear picture of what her days would look like after leaving the high-paced, stressful environment she was accustomed to and tired of.

I acknowledged my client’s good decisions, having created a very good life so far, and I reminded her how exciting it was to see her at this juncture – healthy, financially secure and married to the love of her life. Then I asked her if she was ready to create an even more amazing life!

She began to explore more deeply what she would enjoy spending her time doing and I noticed the light first in her eyes. Then her whole body came alive and she became animated. She knew exactly what she was passionate about and how she would serve others. (It’s moments like these that I and other coaches live for: client transformation!)

The transformation my client experienced at this moment is called a paradigm shift and according to Your Best Year Yet author Jinny Ditzler, “when we take responsibility for our capacity for positive change, we can control and guide our intelligence and our feelings and point them toward the results we want.  As this happens, we are drawn to our goals as if by a magnet.”

During the session with my client, space was created where she freely explored and captured the vision of what was next for her.  This vision of what was possible became the magnet as she literally saw the end goal. 

My client then determined the action steps needed to realize the goal.  In other words, she built the bridge.  Frequently, we worry too much about “how to” build the bridge in the absence of clarity around the end goal – where the bridge will take us. Connect with the goal first is my counsel.  Then the way to get there is not complicated at all!

Says author Steve Chandler, “Great coaches do work that is similar to a sculptor’s work.  They see what’s possible in their client, and then they help the client carve the negative beliefs away.  Soon the client is feeling a freedom he has never known.”
 

I saw the angel in the marble,
And I carved until I set him free.

~ Michelangelo

All the Best,

Cindy Bostick
Mobile:  760.953.1269
Website: www.cindybostick.com
Email: cindy.bostick@bestyearyet.com

by Mike Burge, Best Year Yet UK Program Leader

I’m a Best Year Yet Partner. I’m an executive coach. I run programmes for senior teams in a range of organisations, as well as coaching private clients.  These people have significant breakthrough results, which they acknowledge as being unthinkable before we worked together.

I’ve been a key member of an organisation that won the Queen’s Award for Enterprise in International Trade in the UK.   Prior to this I had a highly successful career in international book publishing. You can read all about it in my biography below. I don’t write this in any way to brag. I share it within a context.

You see I also have multiple sclerosis. As someone who played sport and exercised both actively and with unparalleled joy, when the spectre of a future without that fun and fulfilment loomed – and the resultant loss of friendships from not being able to pursue those passions any more – I went through the traditional grieving cycle of shock, denial, anger, uncertainty . . .

I should say that I’m lucky. I’m still able to walk short distances, drive a car, and I do some exercise. I do my best to look after myself. And yet there’s a gaping hole in my life where that physical adrenalin rush used to be.

I don’t proactively share my situation with new people, as I can sometimes get away with people thinking I’m recovering from some injury. Once they accept I’m someone who is normal in all other ways and has a significant amount to offer professionally, I may tell them. Everyone I do tell says it is not an issue, though I’m not sure this would have been the case with some had I told them when we first met. One never knows.

So why am I sharing this with you?  Because I want to tell you the incredible difference that Best Year Yet made to me.  Here’s my story.

Last year my MS worsened. It’s an illness that doctors can manage, but not cure in the traditional sense. So when I was making my Annual Plan, I made one of my Guidelines “Look after my body.”  As a fit and healthy 28 year old, I’d swum 200 lengths in 80 minutes. We’re not talking Michael Phelps here, but I was proud of that achievement and I remembered it as I was writing my goals. I set one to swim a minimum of 200 lengths of The Old Rectory pool without stopping by December 15^th.

When I started swimming again, even swimming 20 lengths felt a challenge. I was embarrassed getting out of the pool with my wobbly legs. It’s not good for your ego when genuinely concerned people 15 – 20 years older than you, ask if you needed help getting up the stairs to the changing room.

I started a regime of extensive stretching every morning, and slowly I started building up my strength and stamina. A major milestone was reached when I swam 100 lengths non-stop. The walk up the stairs to the changing rooms after that achievement was a personal Everest for me.

By November I plateaued at 120 lengths. Then I really connected with my plan. Not only had my Guideline of looking after my body now become part of my DNA, but also my Paradigm of ‘I do what I know needs doing’ connected with a deeper part of me one evening in early December.

I got to the gym, changed, did my warm up and started swimming. Fatigue and the early signs of cramp started to make themselves known. Then the lesson of ‘Manage Your Thoughts and Feelings’ became a guardian to me. I reached 180 lengths and said to myself, “Don’t stop. Be in the moment”.  When I reached 190, I somehow knew I’d achieve my goal. Whereas before the MS, it had taken me 80 minutes, this time, it had taken me 2 hours.

Strangely there was no dramatic elation when my fingertips touched the side at the end of my 200^th length. I just turned to swim the next length.  I was in the zone, as sports men and women describe it.  When I completed 216 lengths, the cramp really hit, and ‘look after my body’ took on a new meaning. I walked it off up and down the pool, and got straight out of the pool without any help of a bar. I dried myself and walked up the stairs to the changing room as if it was the most natural thing in the world to do.

So what lessons did I learn?

1. Remember my own wisdom.
2. Small stepping stones still produce forward movement.
3. Seek support and share my progress.
4. Manage my thoughts and feelings – don’t let negative voices stop me from doing what I need to do to achieve my goal.
5. Take action – consistently.
6. And celebrate — I did!

I repeat I’m lucky. Whatever your state of health, there are still your personal Everests to climb.  We don’t always ascend them the first time, but with support and resources, you can achieve so much more than you may have thought possible.

I have MS, and I achieved more than I did when I didn’t.

Whatever the word means for you, here’s to your success.

by Ashoka Gore, Best Year Yet Program Leader in Australia 

We are not fully aware of the way we see the world and people around us.  However, if we were able to keep track of what makes us happy, angry, frustrated or disgusted, we would be able to identify some of our paradigms.

A bull when shown a red rag gets agitated and angry.  What are your triggers for anger, sadness, joy, happiness, reflectiveness and so on?

Discovering your paradigms is daunting initially, but as you go along you find it is interesting and fascinating. When your paradigms are deeply rooted, you tend not to listen as you feel you know what is going to happen or be said – you’re making assumptions.

On the other hand if you are able to just observe a situation or person, keeping all thoughts out of your own mind and focusing on the story unraveling in front of you, you experience a childlike excitement as the drama unfolds.

My new empowering paradigm is ‘I Step up and Make a Difference’, which inspires me to take the first step, knowing that doing so makes a positive difference.

Until the first day of this year I was working for a great organization, filled with great people.  We had a product that was good for the environment, and the customers were using it. However, I often felt stale and jaded and struggled to get excited about going to work every day. In such a situation one starts to find someone or something to blame for one’s own lack of joy and enthusiasm. This kind of situation is usually works two ways, with both parties developing paradigms that lead to separation rather than union. Furthermore this dynamic happens all the time in relationships.

Having stumbled across Best Year Yet while doing some research on the Internet, I saw a program that was so simple yet so powerful while being applicable to everyone. This discovery was the trigger for me to change my situation — provided I had the courage. I stepped up, knowing that I could make a difference in my life as well as others.

Leaving a well-paying secure job to start your own business, with no contracts or confirmed sources of income could be considered foolhardy. But if you have self-confidence and belief in yourself and a powerful empowering paradigm to guide you then things start to happen.

 Today we want everything instantly and hate having to wait for success,
while in reality all things happen at a pace that is just right.

You have to drop bad habits and adopt new ones, learn new skills and adapt to working in new ways, and all this takes time and cannot be rushed. This is possible only if you have a strong positive and empowering paradigm, which protects you from all the negativity — provided you keep putting in the effort to bring your paradigm alive and keep it so. Simply having positive thoughts and ideas while sitting idle will not give you results, you need to take action.

The first three months of my new direction have taken up in setting up my company, website, home office, and coming to grips with being the source of my problems as well as the solution. I focused my attention and energy on taking the Best Year Yet program to Vanuatu dubbed the country with the happiest people in the world. The people there are very capable but do not have access to programs and knowledge to enable them to make decisions based on sound values and principles.

Nearly all who saw the Best Year Yet presentation were keen to start, but there were many cultural and managerial factors, which delayed their making a commitment. My resolve has been tested, and my faith and trust come under scrutiny.

However, I have persisted and will get a breakthrough in April doing a program for an iconic organization, which will then open the floodgates.  Having worked in the South Pacific for the last eight years, and having met many wonderful and loving people, simple and uncomplicated, I am driven by my paradigm 

I Step up and Make a Difference

to take the Best Year Yet program to the Pacific countries. It is not going to be easy, but the fruits of the labor will be seen many years from now when the people from the Pacific choose to make every year their Best Year Yet.

By Thomas Freitag, Best Year Yet Partner in Switzerland

I was “The King of To-Do Lists”. Back in the 80’s when there were no electronic devices, a student at the university told me, “You are my role model for being well organized. How do you plan your exams?“ He seemed to be impressed by my bulky personal management notebook. At the same time I was asked by others to organize training sessions on self-management. Looking back, this was probably the starting point of my coaching career.

My motivation was to have everything under control. And as a working student, I needed to manage my time well. I was not happy with the planning tools available on the market, so I printed my own to-do lists in the perfect format with punched holes for my notebook. Checking off those items made me feel so good!

When electronic organizers came into the market, I hoped to be more efficient in managing my lists. So I put all ideas and tasks into my Palm Pilot.  However, the problem with these kinds of things was that the more I used them, the more I was in danger of being over-organized. I had heard Tom Peters say, “When you think you are in control, you are actually out of control.” But I had not yet realized that this statement is not about how to be in control, it’s about the importance of trust.

When kids came into my life, there was less time to work my way down to-do lists. And I could not be perfectly well organized anymore. Too tired to open my to-do list in the evening, too much under pressure in the morning to plan my day, too many urgent things back home and on my desk in the office.

A moment of truth happened one day when I was on my way to work. I was running late for a client meeting because our kids had challenged me by taking too much time to get dressed. I was riding my bike fast when a car suddenly started pushing me aside, ignoring me. I stepped on the breaks and stopped. Without this I would most probably have been in a bad accident. After an unfriendly verbal exchange, I somehow managed to ride the rest of the way to my office and breathe!  I made it!

Later that same morning I was making my new Best Year Yet plan when I discovered that my strongest limiting paradigm was that “I must have everything under control“.  I quickly realized that it was not the car driver who was stressing me. It was me. I did not have my inner balance when I got on the bicycle and felt I needed to be faster than I should. In fact, I had been really lucky not to be hurt or injured. Did I want to risk my physical well-being, just to be on time, to follow my plan? No! I needed a new, powerful positive paradigm.

I then understood that there are guiding forces in our life that we can’t control ~ we must simply trust. My new powerful paradigm finally enabled me to stop micromanaging myself.

 “I trust luck to guide me!”

This new paradigm has had a huge impact on how I organize myself. Here’s what I have changed with my new paradigm:

1. Yes, I still maintain to-do lists, but they are much shorter. My new paradigm helps me to limit the time I spend working on these lists. What counts is what guides me.
2. Every morning before starting any computer or Smartphone, I sit down to read literature that helps me tune my mental energy to what works, what is important to me, and to start into the day in a spiritually positive way.
3. I have started to trust my ability to respond more naturally to all kinds of circumstances in my life. So many things take care of themselves! Today, the most important file in my office is the hanging file labeled “Time Will Deal With It”.
   
4. I trust my body much more. When something tells me I am tired, I let go of my original plan and immediately adjust to the situation. Others say that I have become more flexible.
5. This gives me more focus and energy for the important things that don’t take care of themselves, like calls to clients.

Actually, writing this article was not on my to-do list. On the date it was due, I woke up and finalized this blog post.

Was it by coincidence that a client appointment was cancelled that same day, giving me more time than I had planned to write? I don’t know, but I do know that:

“I can trust a guiding force to manage my way through life, without my constant push.”