Remember, you choose

Everything you do, is a choice. There is very little that you have to do. Breathe, eat, drink, sleep. These are the things you have to do, you are compelled by your biology to do. Pretty much the rest of it is a choice you make.

Every day.

Life can suck and you feel compelled to make certain choices because of the people you have in your life and how they rely on you. So if you are compelled to do certain things from respect, courtesy or duty, you may not feel you have a choice about what you do, but you can have a choice about how you feel about it.

Just by viewing everything you do as a choice, can allow you to re-frame the way you think about it. It is amazing how in control you can feel about your own destiny. It can make you view the actions you take through a different lens and consider certain activities differently. Sometimes you may even go out on a limb and do something you didn’t even feel possible. Like saying no to someone, for example.

It is amazingly enabling to think about all you do and consider what choices you have made to get to where you are. Would you make different ones if you did it all again?

For me the biggest impact on me was something my father told me about a couple of the jobs he held. He told me that he wished he had given one of them up sooner, but he had a family of 4 children to feed. After he told me that, I promised myself I wouldn’t stay in a job that made me miserable.

It took me a few months into a situation at a previous role to realise that I was doing exactly the same thing as my father, just because it paid the bills. Once I realised that, the way I was being treated and felt was a result of a choice I had made to stay, I realised I had to go.

It was one of the most freeing decisions. I now look at all situations as a result of a choice I have made and not something that has been foisted upon me. They may not be the best choices, but they are mine. And when I make a bed, I know I have to lie in it!

In the simplest terms, I support people to prepare to profitably scale. What you do with a room full of people is very different to how you do it when they cross cities, continents or oceans.

I am happy to spend a few minutes working through a challenge you have, as an advisor on officehours.io (Officehours connects you with amazing people, for 10 minutes of free 1-on-1 advice).

Check out my available slots here