PUNCTURES ON THE ROAD TO SUCCESS – a coaching story about growth.

Why the quick-fix approach to problem solving will leave your life in tatters. A teaching from Hang Sen – By Grant Storey

“Why do things keep going wrong?” I asked the old man in exasperation. “Why is it that as soon as I think I have the problem fixed it pops up again, it recurs and every time it is more disheartening than the last? What am I missing here?”

I had become desperate – my physical, mental and emotional health had been a disaster for the last three years and I was forever going through cycles of recuperation, healing and feeling ok, back into a ruthless recurrence of symptoms which had left an army of doctors and specialists utterly baffled as to what the dilemma was.

Where we find growth.

I had come here, to the house of my teacher and advisor, Hang Sen, once again in search of answers. And this was his reply. “So many people” he began, “are always looking only in the now for the quick-fix and for the instant solution or remedy to their suffering. Problems exist on the road of life so that we may ride over them and experience all the opportunity for growth that they afford. But people do not like to do this. They have forgotten the meaning that lies in the problems they encounter on their individual and collective paths.”

“They have forgotten to see the problems littered on the road to success for what they really are” he paused, gazing at me with those black eyes sparkling with intensity, his voice dripping with wisdom. “Jewels of opportunity that contain within them the seeds of greatness. Instead you, and millions of others just like you, have bought into the delusion that the jewel is a mere shard of glass that is causing you an unnecessary and perhaps even painful delay on the road to your success.”

“So” he continued, “people are much like a bicycle tire that is forever going around and around on the road of life, hitting a thorn or loose shard of glass now and again and going through the experience of getting a puncture. What happens then is at times amusing and at others it is tragic. In most cases, the person immediately sets about fixing the puncture as quickly as possible, pumping up the tire and moving on again until of course the tire rides over another problem, and another puncture results, to which the same remedy is applied, and the puncture is fixed and then off they go again, until they hit another problem and get another puncture and so on it goes.”

He was smiling broadly now, clearly amused with this particular analogy. “The funny thing is” he said, letting out a little chuckle, “is that more often than not it is the same piece of glass in the road that the person is actually riding over. All this moving off and getting punctures and patching up and then moving off again at a frantic pace is in fact an act of delusion in that the tire is unaware that it is going nowhere, but rather riding in place like a hamster wheel, continuously moving over the same puncture again and again.”

“It is the programmed nature of people to want to move off and onward all the time. People do not like to be stopped in their tracks. People do not like to stop full stop. And so this process continues and the punctures keep on occurring. More and more patches are placed on the tire until the tire becomes so tattered and patched up that its total integrity is completely compromised paving the way for a huge disaster to occur.”

“Again, this comes down to the perception of the puncture”, Hang Sen smiled, “because whenever ones perceives a puncture as merely an irritating and perhaps even debilitating shard of glass, and seeks only to patch themselves up as superficially as possible in order to get moving again, they are rendering themselves ignorant to the true meaning of their predicament. They are in fact blinding themselves to the opportunity that the problem is affording them – which is of course to grow.”

“They are mistaking a precious jewel for a shard of broken glass and in so doing they are failing to grow past the so called ‘problem’ and when that happens”, Hang Sen said drumming his finger into the palm of his hand, “they are merely setting themselves up to ride over the same ‘shard of glass’ time and again until they learn to see it for what it truly is.”

“Until you learn to see your problems as jewels of opportunity which are there to enable you to grow beyond your limited self of yesterday, you will never step into the understanding of your true potential which lies waiting for you today!”

Editor’s Note: Call it Entrepreneurial A.D.D. Excited by all the problems we are solving, we miss the root problem. It starts with spending 30 minutes a day “thinking before we act.” Some of the other articles on this website explore this possibility further. Growth in small business rarely occurs without prior thought and planning.

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Do you get it at the hands of a ham-fisted parent?   Is it imposed by a teacher to the tune of a hickory stick?  Or is it self-discipline, controlling the raging bull of Id, managing the slings and arrows of outrageous entrepreneurship?

And our adversary, procrastination, is universal!

However described or imposed, discipline is what many small businesses, and small business owners lack, need, pay lip service to, and ignore!

We can recall when we decided not to report to “the man” any longer.  We would be our own boss, make it on our own, with a clear picture of what had to be done, and when, and by whom!

At the same time, we also gave ourselves permission to procrastinate, fudge, wiggle out, or flat-out change our minds – about duties, deadlines and obligations.  Sounded pretty good, best of both worlds.

It’s why banks are so squirrely about loaning money to young small businesses.  It’s why 6 million small businesses started  up this year.  It’s also why 40% of them are gone in the first year, 80% in four!  Time and capital invested without significant return.  Not good stuff.

If you have been troubled by the lack of discipline in your business, for whatever reason, this article is for you.

Now, there is an absurdly great joy in what can be called “self-mastery.”  In that bucket goes the accomplishment of something you’ve been procrastinating.  The weight lifted off your shoulders is formidable  (of course, you hadn’t noticed it before!).  The sense of being “back in command of yourself” is exciting.  And all because you did something you’d set out to do a while ago, and had put off.

Some of my clients personalize this phenomenon – call it “their demon.”  So did Joseph Campbell, a man who understood what we construct in our minds – he was an expert on myths, and demons.  “If I swallow my demon, I gain his power, for the greater life’s pain, the greater life’s return.”

Recommendation:  First, acknowledge procrastination.  “We have met the enemy and he is us!”  Create some systems which expose it (I like the Getting Things Done process by David Allen. )  Also you can get yourself an accountability partner.  Someone exterior to your business, to whom you can account.     Someone who will manage the responsibility of accountability with understanding, generosity, and fidelity to the strategic, tactical and financial objectives of your business.

Successful businesspeople, like the acrobat at the top of this article,  try to manage this issue rigorously.  By confronting the discipline issue, you can have clear performance targets, hit them or miss them, celebrate your victories and learn from your mistakes (one of the most valuable opportunities for a small business operator. ) In this way, you have the freedom you sought and avoid some of the real liabilities.

The truth of it, however,  is that the demon is as devious as we are, for obvious reasons!  You and I can procrastinate anything, anytime.  You can’t stamp it out, but there are some excellent processes for dealing with it, and the results and delight are amazing!

Further conversation?  Craig Jennings, Business Coach, 516 944-6454, www.craigjennings.com, craig@craigjennings.com

By Harvey Mackay

I got a phone call from a Fortune 500 CEO last week whom I had never met. After decades of begging the government to relax their regulatory grip and let his industry experience the joys of competition, his wish had been granted – and his bottom line had plummeted.

He wanted me to talk to his top executives for two hours and zero in on negotiating strategies.

A bit overwhelmed, I said, “I’m very flattered but frankly, I don’t know if I can talk for two hours on negotiating.”

Then I realized I was actually negotiating with myself. As my brain finally reconnected, I cut myself off. “Well, let me sleep on it and I’ll get back to you.”

Later that evening, I began to write down some of my negotiating experiences and saw that my problem was going to be holding the speech down to two hours.

I’d already brushed up against the first and second laws of negotiating that morning in my conversation with the CEO.

1. Never accept any proposal immediately, no matter how good it sounds.

2. Never negotiate with yourself. You’ll furnish the other side with ammunition they might never have gotten themselves. Don’t raise a bid or lower an offer without first getting a response.

Here are some more rules of the road:

3. Never cut a deal with someone who has to “go back and get the boss’ approval.” That gives the other side two bites of the apple to your one. They can take any deal you are willing to make and renegotiate it.

4. If you can’t say yes, it’s no. Just because a deal can be done, doesn’t mean it should be done. No one ever went broke saying “no” too often.

5. Just because it may look nonnegotiable, doesn’t mean it is. Take that beautifully printed “standard contract” you’ve just been handed. Many a smart negotiator has been able to name a term and gets away with it by making it appear to be chiseled in granite, when they will deal if their bluff is called.

6. Do your homework before you deal. Learn as much as you can about the other side. Instincts are no match for information.

7. Rehearse. Practice. Get someone to play the other side. Then switch roles. Instincts are no match for preparation.

8. Beware the late dealer. Feigning indifference or casually disregarding timetables is often just a negotiator’s way of trying to make you believe he/she doesn’t care if you make the deal or not.

9. Be nice, but if you can’t be nice, go away and let someone else do the deal. You’ll blow it.

10. A deal can always be made when both parties see their own benefit in making it.

11. A dream is a bargain no matter what you pay for it. Set the scene. Tell the tale. Generate excitement. Help the other side visualize the benefits, and they’ll sell themselves.

12. Don’t discuss your business where it can be overheard by others. Almost as many deals have gone down in elevators as elevators have gone down.

13. Watch the game films. Top players in any game, including negotiating, debrief themselves immediately after every major session. They always keep a book on themselves and the other side.

14. No one is going to show you their hole card. You have to figure out what they really want. Clue: Since the given reason is never the real reason, you can eliminate the given reason.

15. Always let the other side talk first. Their first offer could surprise you and be better than you ever expected.

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Harvey Mackay is a nationally syndicated columnist and author of the New York Times #1 bestseller “Swim With The Sharks Without Being Eaten Alive.” This article also appears on Harvey’s website, and was reprinted with his permission.