Growing into the unknown!

Alternative Paths by Jonathan Fields



When good is near you, when you have life in yourself, it is not by any known or accustomed way; you shall not discern the foot-prints of any other; you shall not see the face of man; you shall not hear any name; the way, the thought, the good, shall be wholly strange and new. - Ralph Waldo Emerson


The world buzzes about goals and visions. Focus. Create a vivid picture of exactly where you want to go. Dream big, then don’t let anything or anyone stop you. The problem, as Daniel Gilbert wrote in Stumbling Upon Happiness, is that we’re horrible at forecasting how we’ll really feel 10 or 20 years from now – once we’ve gotten what we dreamed of. Often, we get there only to say, “That’s not what I thought it would be,” and ask, “What now?” Ambition is good. Blind ambition is not. It blocks out not only distraction, but the many opportunities that might take you off course but that may also lead you in a new direction. Consistent daily action is only a virtue when bundled with a willingness to remain open to the unknown. In this exercise, look at your current quest and ask, “What alternative opportunities, interpretations and paths am I not seeing?” They’re always there, but you’ve got to choose to see them.
 
I have begun to learn a truth that the minute we define what perfect is, we limit the place where we can go.    The concept in this principle is that today I know only what I know, but tomorrow I will know more.  So if I fix where I am going today, then tomorrow I may be going somewhere that is less that where I could have gone without the limit or the focus on what I thought was good but turns out with new information less than good. 
 
This causes me a bit of a conundrum as I am trying to practice outcome based thinking, where I work mentally to determine what a successful outcome will be.  My concern is that as I do this outcome based thinking and dream big, am I open to having my course change, to learn new things and ultimately change the outcome that I am shooting for.  The quote above rightly states that as we commit daily action to a goal, this daily action will only be a virtue if we embrace walking into the unknown and are willing to have our thinking evolve with the new information that we learn.
 
As my company has grown, I have limited the areas that I allowed it to grow so that I could be sure we were growing well.  My challenge today is to determine if I have grown enough staff to enlist my staff in growing new areas of my company and assist my current staff in doing this leadership work that until now, only I have done.