We are all born with potential to reach heights that we may only dream of: potential to do, to achieve, to make a difference. Too often these dreams just fade away into the reality of life’s demands. But does it have to be this way?
Recently I did a zoom interview with Stan Peake where he talks about his mission to help one million leaders to discover their potential.
ONE MILLION!
That caught my attention. First off, I felt like Stan and I were kindred spirits as I have a mission too, and that is to help people discover their speaking potential. Make a difference in their lives and in the lives of those around them.
But, how do you do that? In my interview I ask three critical and informative questions.
How do you unleash human potential?
“In order to see someone’s potential you have to be looking for it. As a coach, one of the most important skills is to remain patient and to be curious. When I meet with an entrepreneur or an executive or a team, one of the first things … that’s a point of curiosity for me is … what is this person capable of?
I look for passion. That is a big indicator. What someone is passionate about is going to be highly indicative of what their potential is because we’re not going to be great at anything that we don’t truly enjoy. Your passion is probably your curiosity, things you are most drawn to or want to learn about.
What do you find is the biggest the biggest roadblock people face when it comes to discovering their passion, their potential?
Stan continued,
“I would say that would be limiting beliefs. Their inner voice that tells them or what they’ve heard growing up and they’ve allowed it to become a belief”.
I knew from my own coaching experience about the fears and limiting beliefs my clients had had around public speaking.
“They’ve allowed it to become true in their own mind where they tell themselves what they’re not good at or aren’t capable of. I’m not a good public speaker or I don’t have ideas worth sharing or I’m not someone who takes the stage or someone who publishes a book. They are too self-critical of their own ideas. They tell themselves no one wants to hear what I have to say.
The great news is that you can change any belief you want”
If your aspirations are to take the stage and speak, you have got to develop your resiliency muscle. This means coming face to face with adversity and failure and learning how to deal with it.
If you don’t believe you can build a business, how many sales calls are you likely to make? Our belief system informs our emotions which informs our actions and backing it up even further, our beliefs are influenced by our thoughts. We don’t control what thoughts enter our brain, but we can control what thoughts we choose to pay attention to.
If you want to build a hundred million dollar company and you have thoughts like … I need to take a part-time job making $20 an hour because you feel desperate or you’re stuck in scarcity mode … then you are taking action based on a thought that’s inconsistent with what you’re trying to create.
If you look for problems, you’re going to find problems. A lot of people are looking for what they don’t want to see. You need to look for what you want. Don’t stare at what you don’t want.
Get clear. Visualize what you want, and you will actually have a neurological advantage. Changing the way we think affects our performance. Feelings follow statements in the brain. Visualization is so powerful”.
When Stan said that, I remembered reading about motivational expert psychologist Darrell Burnett who said, “Positive thinking is a learned behavior. It’s something that requires practice. Neurologically when you visualize yourself performing positively, certain parts of the brain are set in motion. The more you ‘see it’ the more likely it is ‘to happen’.
Stan continued,
“It’s hard to beat someone who’s already won in their own mind, and this is the power of visualization”.
Then I moved to ask my last question.
We have a lot of people out there starting their own business. They want to move forward. And, as I knew from my own experience, are held back by their limiting beliefs.
Stan, What are three things they can do right now, today, to help them move forward?
“The first thing is get clear on what you want, not just get clear on your goals.
A lot of people when it comes to setting their goals default to the things they think they need. I want to make this much money. I want to have a bigger house. I want to drive a nicer car, and those are nice to have, but those aren’t necessarily what someone truly wants. What people want is to feel a certain way, is to live a certain way and be surrounded by the people they love and want to spend time with. It’s to learn certain things. Do certain things. Have certain freedoms. Getting clear on what we want would be the first.
The second step would be come up with ideas of how to get there.
And, don’t worry about ‘the how’ to get there. Don’t say, Oh that’s too big. Just come up with plans for how you might do it.
And, the third step is to take action.
Even if you fail, failure feels better than indecision. Just get up and try something new. The highest performers that I’ve ever worked with … the professional athletes, the Olympians, the most powerful executives follow through on their promises to themselves. It’s a cornerstone of high performance.
A few days after my interview with Stan, I opened one of my file folders, and saw a quote I had written down by actor Will Smith,
“I feel very strongly we are who we choose to be”.
Those are powerful words and I feel an inspiring wrap-up to my interview with Stan.