Thursday, May 7, 2009

I Believe In You


I am blessed in many ways in my life. I have a loving and healthy family; friends and colleagues who constantly expand my knowledge and challenge me; a home that provides just enough space to be together and to get away; a cottage up-north that my mother-in-law allows us to share; extended family members who are always willing to help out; a career that allows me to meet so many bright and engaging people. I’ve known about all of these for some time. What I didn’t know until recently was that I was also blessed in one of the greatest ways possible.

Earlier in the year as my customer engagement was ending and the start of a search for the next customer was starting, I talked to my wife about writing books. I had been talking about writing books and building a public speaking career for some time – likely since high school – but never really put full effort toward it. I had actually started several different books, but never finished them.

On this day, I mentioned to my wife again how this year I would finish 2 books and begin speaking about them. I told her how excited I was for that to happen in addition to my consulting career. As I talked about this, Tracy nodded her head and when I was finished, she said, “I know.”

It was a pretty simple gesture with few words, but it had immense impact. I paused a few seconds absorbing her words. I then told her how most people hearing my dreams and aspirations would roll their eyes and think, ‘Here he goes again.’ “But you,” I said, “actually believe in me.”

She replied, “I know that if you say it’s going to happen and really believe it will, it will.”

Since that day, I have completed the final version of my initial book, have been able to set up several speaking engagements to create pre-orders for my book and am within a few weeks of completing my second book. Certainly these were goals of mine before the conversation with my wife, but as we all know, setting goals and achieving them are 2 different things. The power of having one person believe in you gets you from setting to achieving.

Don’t underestimate the power you have to propel others. During these economic times, those struggling need us to continue believing in them and we need to continue believing in ourselves to overcome and create the next great economy.