July 6

I am finally back focused again after the wedding, a week in Mexico and the catching up. I had a great insight last week that has helped me focus the future. I was reading Twyla Tharp's book, The Creative Habit. I would definitely recommend it. In the second chapter she asked the question - what is your creative DNA? What is that thing that most energizes you? What is that thing that makes you want to stay up late or get up early?

I started pondering the question about my own life. It did not take me long to identify my creative DNA - the study of the mind. It has always been a fascination for me. It has been at the center of everything that I done over the past 30 years that I really enjoyed. I love executive coaching because you are exploring the mind of the person you are working with and helping them learn to understand their own mind and how it is impacting their life. I remember as a teenager begin fascinated by stories of the monks in Southeast Asia that were able to regulate their body heat and stay outside in the cold with only their wraps for long periods of time.

I started thinking about the books that I have loved over the years. All of them had to with exploring the mind and how it can change your life. I thought about the journey that I have taken over the past three years. It has been a journey into my mind.

Grasping that incredible point has helped me refine and refocus the future for my business. the stuff that I have done over the past thirty years has been good stuff, but little of it was directly connected to my creative DNA. I realize now that I left the church and begin working with businesses, thinking that I could find personal power and prosperity in that realm. While I found some of both, unlimately, it never really gave me what I needed, because I was not focused on my creative DNA - helping others explore their mind and discover the potential that is there.

One more insight and I will stop today. I started thinking about how I describe myself. People ask you want you do. I have used all kinds of words to describe what I do over the years. Some of them have been elaborate and some skimpy, but they all felt hollow. So one day I started writing the sentence, "I am a..." I stopped and wasn't sure how to complete the sentence. At first I thought - minister. I am a minister, but that didn't fit. I don't really think of myself as a minister anymore. Then I thought, healer. But that did not ring true either. I don't think I have healed anyone but myself. The truth for me is that the people who heal others are few and far between - and they certainly are not on television. Then the word hit me that resonated with my heart.

I am a guide. My role is to help show people the way. I can walk with them for some of the journey, but untimately, we must all follow our own path. My job is to light the way so that you might find your path. That is the phrase that has stuck with we. I like it. It is like the searsucker suit that I bought for Drew's wedding. I put it on and I immediately liked it. It felt good. it felt right. It was me.

As I look at the future of the business and how I will spend my life, it will focus on being a guide - a light to others on the journey to find their path.