Stay the Course, AND Tweak As You Go
For some reason I’ve spent the last few days being curious about what I call “the correction factor.” As I contemplate my life and the journey I’m on, overall I feel like I’m on the right track. For sure. I see the impact that I’m creating in the world, I hear the feedback that I get from the people I connect with…and yet I know there’s so much MORE that I could be creating. So much more I could be facilitating. So much more I could be accomplishing. The challenge is this: I haven’t really been able to get clear on what the “more” is. At this point, it’s a feeling — an intuitive knowing that there’s some gap that only I can fill, and I haven’t quite honed in on it. I’m close — and it’s as though I’m two or three kaleidoscope clicks away from the perfect pattern that’s meant to be mine.
What I’ve realized as I’ve sat with this feeling over the last few days is this: in the past, I would feel tempted to cut and run. Not run as in “run away” from anything in particular, but run as in “change direction”, run towards something else. All this did was leave me feeling confused. This time, however, I’m choosing — actually, it’s more like understanding the need — to honour the feeling of “rightness” about the path I’m on — and looking at where, how and what I might tweak even as I stay the course. There’s a way that I know I’m up to great things; I’m actually having the effect that I want to have in the world, just not on the scale that I want. So now, I get to hold the question of how to magnify or augment what I do — without actually changing what it is I’m doing. This is new for me.
When I extrapolate this idea to the general area of leadership, I realize that the lesson holds true. There’s a way that, as a leader (whether in the political sense, organizational, business or familial), you’ve got to always evaluate whether or not you’re on track. And even when you’re on track, you’ve got to measure the effectiveness of what it is you’re creating. And as you measure and evaluate, you’ve got to tweak — modify, adjust — without actually straying from the course, without losing sight of the ultimate destination.
Bottom-line: once you know you’re on track, stay there. Tweak as you must, but stay the course. My sense is that is how you experience the success that you really want.
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