Motivation Monday – How To Respond To “Now What?”
“Seismic shifts externally require seismic shifts internally.
They must happen IN YOU before they happen TO YOU.”
This isn’t the first seismic shift the world is experiencing. And it won’t be the last.
As I speak to and coach leaders, no matter where I am, the question I hear most often in the face of seismic shifts, is “NOW WHAT? NOW WHAT?”
It is a question that carries the weight of visceral raw fear. Just as we adjust to new normals, around the corner another external tsunami-like shift is waiting to come with force and turn our world upside down. NOW WHAT?
Seismic shifts externally require seismic shifts internally. They must happen IN YOU before they happen TO YOU.
What is a seismic shift?
It is a dramatic, drastic change, a paradigm shift. It’s radical, like a rock slide or avalanche literally changing the landscape or like a tsunami obliterating all that came before.
These changes come in times of life whether you are making a big decision like university, career, marriage, moving, facing illness or loss, or when the world is turning upside down without your consent.
Here are three ways to respond to seismic shifts and the now what? question you are asking:
CLARIFY YOU, YOUR VALUES, AND WHAT YOU ARE PREPARED TO LIVE AND DIE FOR.
Because if you don’t know who you are and what you were created for, other people will tell you and not even charge you!
CREATE THE CULTURE YOU WANT TO LIVE IN AND THE ONE YOU WANT FOR OTHERS
The culture you want is characterized by
• Relentless Compassion – raising the value of and ascribing dignity to each human life regardless of gender, race, or class.
• Ruthless Candour – being okay to tell the truth with grace and skill.
• Risk-Taking – not letting the fear of either failure or success keep you from trying.
• Creativity- there are things yet to be created that don’t exist now and maybe you will be the one to do it
COMMIT
85% of all change initiatives fail. To ensure your seismic shift sticks:
#1 Stay in your lane.
#2 Stay in your lane.
#3 Stay in your lane.
Don’t look around at what everyone else is doing. This is your game, your time, your fight, your race, your dance, your work given to you to do.
There is a God in heaven that dreamed of all you would be on this earth and created things for you to do as His workmanship. He is heavily invested in making sure you not only finish the job but finish strong.
But even when you commit – you still have a choice.
• You can leave the room before the party starts, give up in the green room just before you head to the platform, or just leave the building. Maybe you’re choosing to leave because you’re scared of success just as much as failure.
• You can stay and give a little, make it look like you are contributing, like you really do care for the team or for yourself, but really you are withholding the best parts of yourself.
• You can ignore everything pretend this isn’t really happening. Bury your head in the sand and maybe it will all go away.
But your best choice is to use your voice to speak up.
Voice comes from the Latin root vocare, which is also the root word for vocation. Finding your voice is about so much more than a career choice or a platform speak. It’s about having clarity of life direction. It’s about giving full expression to your true self, holding nothing back.
I don’t know how many years I spent self-silencing – waiting for others to speak up for me. Maybe you’ve done the same.
I have a heart for the female voice and know that the work in this lane is important since we hold up half the sky, are half of the human population, and are underrepresented, underheard, and often rendered invisible.
We cannot change the world without the full invitation to and full participation of women and girls to bring their best gifts to every sphere of influence, including the church.
Are you asking the question, “now what?” in response to decisions in your life – school, life partner, job change, raising your kids, launching a movement, becoming an entrepreneur, writing your book, developing your voice? Whatever it is – you can become the answer to your own question, with God’s guidance.
Every day is a new opportunity for a landslide of external forces to hit you in the face. But you can be ready.
Why don’t you shift your NOW WHAT? question into the answer,
“NOW, ME! I’ll do it. I’ll stand up, step out and speak up. NOW WHAT? NOW ME!”
I believe in you!
Cathie