Use The Power Of Community To Help You Create Your Own Path
Can you imagine what life would be like if someone else made all of your decisions and told you what to do every moment of every day? To be forced to do things you hate…to be kept from expressing any of your personal likes and dislikes. Being deprived of your self-determination is a horrible injustice. Yet sometimes, you may take for granted or misuse the right to create your own path in life.
Of course, we’ll run into bumps and seemingly insurmountable obstacles on our chosen path. Sometimes it may become so difficult you may want to give up. Please, don’t, just keep putting one foot in front of the other and you’ll get past that roadblock. After all, if were easy, you wouldn’t be growing, testing the waters outside your comfort zone, and extending yourself fully.
It’s helpful to take a step back and look at your path, regularly and often. This constant reassessment, which allows for course correction, is the key to moving forward. People who sail on the open sea know this very well. When the wind becomes strong, they don’t continue to try to reach their destination in a beeline. Rather they employ a skill known as tacking. The captain turns the bow toward the wind so that the wind’s direction changes from first the left side and then the right side, allowing a zig-zag progression toward the desired direction. The obstacle, the wind, is then turned into an asset, propelling them forward with much more speed than if there were no wind or obstacle at all.
Are you on your path, or someone else’s?
One of my favorite books is WOLFPACK: How to Come Together, Unleash Our Power and Change the Game, by Abby Wambach. She’s a two-time Olympic gold medalist and FIFA World Cup champion and is noted for her leadership skills as she helped transform her soccer teammates into one of the most successful, powerful and united Wolfpacks of all time.
She reminds us that the old rule, the one we grew up in, the one that says to “Stay on the path”, isn’t designed for women today. The new rule is to create your own path.
Take time to consider if you’re on the right path for you. Especially, if you have set goals for yourself based on something you read, advice from an “expert” or a conversation with a friend without ensuring that it’s the right goal for you. Is it getting you nearer or further away from your destination?
It’s important to base your goals on who you really are, instead of who you wish you were. This takes a lot of grace, compassion and self-knowing. Truly accepting who you are helps you set routines and systems that help you succeed. So, as you step back to reassess, ask yourself: “Is this goal designed for me or for someone I wish I were?”
Create your own path, but don’t walk it alone.
As in the case of Abby Wamback, successful leadership involves not only claiming our individual power, but also uniting our Pack or community and forging new trails. Your power to create your new path doesn’t come from trying to go it alone. The new path embraces accountability. As women, the power of the collective is a potent source of accountability.
I’ll let you in on my secret…I hire a coach who helps me create my own path. She helps me stay accountable while I’m pushing and stretching myself out of my comfort zone of repeating old patterns. It’s essential to have a community that is cheering for you, is excited, and holds you accountable.
Who is in your community of allies that helps you stay true to your goals? Who are your accomplices who will support you when you veer away from your destination? How can you develop more allies in your accountability plans? I’m creating something new that will support highly motivated women to bring their brilliance to the world. It’s called the Great Circle Community and, in the fall, I’ll be inviting a few select women to join. Stay tuned for more information! But if this excited you as much as it does me, contact me and tell me you’re interested.
Thank you for the photo Andrew Neel