Happy Sunday Everyone-
I woke up Tuesday morning and had an interesting thought; “why” do I do every single thing that I do. My journal entries are normally sacred to me, but I’ll share this one in the hopes it puts some of this in perspective.
“Feeling a hamster wheel routine right now. Email, calls, meetings I don’t need to be in, or meaningless meetings. move the needle in each meeting or don’t attend the meeting. What is the agenda for each meeting. Financials, are we trending up or down, if we’re trending up, keep it up, if we’re trending down, what is one thing we can implement in the next 30 days to get this dialed in, what questions do you have about your P & L, and then move on. Keep things progressing, everything has a purpose or don’t do it. Show up to everything with a purpose. Why am I here? Why am I reading this book? Why I am working out? why am i listening to this podcast, why am I working on my faith? Why am i drinking this wine? Why Am I eating this cheeseburger? Why am I drinking this smoothie? Why am I doing this business planning session? Why? why? Asking why in every single thing I do? I get answers I like and answers I don’t, but it makes me reconsider WHY I’m doing it. Think about asking myself the “why” on everything, whether I like the answer I’m coming up with or not…it’s either repelling or confirming I’m on the right path”.
I just looked up the definition of the word “why”, it came back with “for what reason or purpose”. Something magical about looking up the definition of a word. Is there a better lens to look at every single question you have in life other than what is the reason or purpose I’m doing this?
I fully understand you could read this and think it’s a little over the top, like it’s a little unrealistic to think we’re going to go through life with 24/7 intentionality by running every single decision through the lens of “why am i doing this?” but I’d ask you to reconsider, why not. I spent the rest of my week with the “why” lens turned on. A few examples:
- Call to a listing agent-could be hit or miss normally on my excitement to explain our client. Why mindset-I’m calling to impact getting this offer accepted, I’m going all in, bring it. It’s the singular purpose of this call.
- Internal meeting-could be normal bs, slow paced, minimal agenda, meetings scheduled for 30 minutes, takes 30 minutes. Why mindset-impact our culture, drive the meeting, ask the questions that need to be asked, solve issues, move forward, if its 15 minutes, end it.
- Jack/Thomas calling-whatever, how are you, shoot the shi@, move on. Why mindset-I’ve got 10 minutes to impact my boy’s life, bring it, love them, listen to them, advise them, make it count.
- Gate guard who always brings the energy-normally, drive through with a smile and move on. Why mindset-be grateful for her energy, give her a tip and let her know she’s impacting everyone that crosses her path.
All 4 of the above happened this week and it was amazing! It’s hard to articulate where my brain is on asking this question, I’m hopeful it makes some sense to you. I think the best way I can say it is by asking the why question immediately validates what is meaningful and minimizes what is meaningless.
Enjoy this super bowl Sunday. We have too many folks in the pacific NW not to root for the Seakhawks!