Last week’s blog post focused on the idea that your
ability to consider consequences—your “What If” thinking—could be positive or
negative for you.
If you’re focused on all the things that could possibly
go wrong, most likely, those “what ifs” will drive you to focus on negatives,
maybe even potential catastrophes. When you’re focused on negative
consequences, that’s what you may tend to create. Why? Because that’s where
your focus is. The ideas that come to you will more likely have to do with
negative outcomes, and when your focus is on negative things you don’t want to
see happen, it’s a recipe for anxiety as well as being a recipe for attracting
all that negativity and unfortunate outcomes.
While it may be fine to consider what might go wrong so
that you can prepare for it and fix it, if your focus is only on what could go wrong, you most likely won’t have enough
creative energy to dream about a big, successful outcome.
You see, both types of “what if” thinking are necessary
for success. The awareness of what can go wrong is fine if it leads you to take
steps to repair the weak areas in your plan. But maybe even more important is
the ability to think “what if” in a positive direction.
Businesses that are successful, and people who are really
successful allow themselves to consider “what if” to allow them to stretch and
build something that maybe no one has thought of before.
Innovation depends upon examining positive “what ifs.”
Thomas Edison considered what would happen if we could harness energy to light
our homes. The Wright Brothers thought about creating a machine that humans
could ride in what might fly from one place to another. Bill Gates and Steve
Jobs used slightly different approaches to focus on the “what if” question of
what if a computer didn’t have to take up a whole floor of a building?
The positive “what ifs” focus on possibilities. It allows
people to invent things people have never seen before. It allows the creation
of new approaches, new methods, new techniques, and entirely new fields and
professions.
One of the “what if” questions I always ask myself when I
want to stimulate thinking about positive “what ifs” is
“What
would you do if you knew you could not fail?”
That approach lets you take any negative “what ifs” out
of consideration and allows you to dream big. It allows you to consider
possibilities that you might not have thought possible.
The idea with this question and with positive “what if”
thinking is that it allows you to bypass your limitations, and by doing that,
you’re able to dream bigger and stretch yourself more. Maybe you’ll consider
doing something or creating something that you hadn’t thought possible because
of your previous focus on the negative.
Imagining “what if” possibilities allows you to make
choices and to uncover where your greatest passion lies. It allows you to let
go of self-imposed limitations—like thinking “that can’t be done,” or “that
would be impossible.” It allows you to imagine “what if it could be done?” That gets your mind working to problem-solve and to
create new approaches and new ideas.
You’re able to harness your brain to work for you, instead of against you. When that happens there are no limits to where you can
go and what you can accomplish.
When you think about harnessing your brain this way, does
that make you feel empowered? Fearful? Overwhelmed? Cynical? Optimistic? If you
need help exploring how this positive “what if” thinking might work in your life, I’d be happy to talk with you
about it in a free half-hour phone call. During that call, I’ll work with you
to figure out your next step. Email me at Linda@InnerResourceCenter.com or call me at 865-983-7544. Sometimes all it takes is having somebody to
bounce an idea off of. I’ve been fortunate in my life to have people I could do
that with, so I’m happy to serve that purpose for others. Because my “what if”
is
“What
if we all reached out to others who need or want a sounding board?
What
if we encouraged each other to move forward?
What
if we helped each other overcome limitations that block us?
What
if we each used our unique abilities to help others succeed?
What
could our world be like?”
Take the first step today to create what is possible. Let me help.
(c) 2017 Linda S. Pucci, Ph.D. All rights reserved.
Posts
