How is not important

In a lot of my previous work, I discuss plans and vision. There is talk, at length, about the fact that there needs to be a specific plan to get you from where you are to where you want to be. It is mentioned that without such a plan you are doomed to repeat all the things that you have done up until this point, for the rest of your life.

 From all this, one could easily get the impression that I believe you should be micromanaging every hour of every day and how it gets done. That how every single little thing gets done should be planned out ahead of time to the last detail. That there should be a vision of the way everything is done and that everything must be done exactly according to that vision.

This could not be farther from the truth. In fact such micro-management leads to insanity. It leads to a person becoming a completely obsessive control freak. Let me show you what I mean.

When I was younger, I lived under the thumb of my stepfather. From my perspective at least, I could never do anything to his satisfaction. And for a long time the things that happened simply boggled my mind.

He DID have an exact method by which he wanted everything done. My natural inclination was to do things by the simplest most efficient methods. We obviously grew up very differently because my way and his way were never the same. Doing things his way often seemed like the thing itself was a punishment. It would take longer, use more resources and quite often produce a lower quality result than the way that I was used to doing things.

I would do things my way. He would get mad at me and ask me why I didn't do things the way he wanted them done. But anything I responded with that wasn't me agreeing with him about his way being better either got ignored or got me disciplined.

Sometimes he would ask if I did what he asked and when I said I did, things seemed to be okay for awhile, until he queried whether or not I had done them his way. Then all hell would break loose. It was always his way or the highway, with no quarter given.

Let me ask you this. If your plan involves becoming the owner of a yacht, and a deceased relative wills you one just like the one you would have bought for yourself, should you sink it and go about getting the boat "your" way? Would you do that? Of course not. That would be insane.

You may intend to get wealthy by writing the next great American novel. But if what happens instead is a penny stock that you invested in suddenly becomes a Fortune 500 company and you find yourself swimming in money, why be upset about it? Just quit your job and enjoy the new freedom. If you want to, you can still invest the time and energy to become a bestselling author, but now you don't have to.

We all have a vision of the way things are going to be or the way they should be. But the bottom line is the result. As long as what you are doing is morally and legally sound, who cares how things get done? What matters is that it gets done and that you are happy with the quality of the result. Don't be attached to the image you have in your head of how things will happen. Because most of the time, that image is wrong.

Specific things do have to happen in order for your life to be the way you want it to be. Exactly how they happen is really not important. Let go of the image. Become attached to the results. Or as I like to say, function over form. Screw the details.

Complete fail

So, there was this plan for today and due to something that I failed to do, that thing cannot happen today.

See, for the past few years we have been pretty negligent in the overall upkeep of our home. Internally we have done most of the day to day cleaning one would expect. But the long term type of stuff has been put off inside the house and except for cutting the grass shortly before the city decides to fine us, most of the outside of our home has been ignored.

As part of our plan to live in excellence and improve every area of our lives we decided that this could not continue. We got together, sat down and wrote up a list of the thing that needed doing, room by room inside and area by area on the outside of the house. The list is several pages long.

One of the items on that list was pressure cleaning the outside of our house. Due to vegetation that had grown up right next to the house in a  bunch of areas and deteriorating lawn furniture the bottom two feet or so of most of the front of our house is a greenish black color, which by the way, doesn't go very well with the exterior paint color of our home. The plants and furniture are gone but the greenish black color remains.

What was supposed to happen today is, I was supposed to get up early go out to Home Depot, rent a pressure cleaner and then another roommate, one who has some experience in such matters, was going to use said device to pressure clean the outside of our house. What actually happened is, I failed to set my alarm and woke up way too late to get the required tool to clean our house today.

 If I were still the same person I was twenty years ago, or if I were like many people still are today, I would be beating myself up over this mistake. There would be stress, angst and frustration over how I screwed up such a simple task. My self worth would take a hit. I would probably avoid my roommate so I could avoid dealing with or in fact even admitting that I had broken an agreement. My day would effectively be ruined due to a simple dumb mistake. I would carry around all that negative energy without even realizing it and it would color other interactions that I have with people for at least today and maybe even longer.

But none of that would be useful or productive and it would only serve to lower the quality of my life. And THAT is unacceptable. So unless you want many of those same things in your life, I suggest and request for your own sake that you learn from my example. Instead of  beating yourself up over every single thing that you do wrong or that you forget to do, do what I do, and what I did in this case.

There was a light tapping at my door. I had been asleep. It instantly woke me. People don't normally knock on my bedroom door. So, I spent a moment going over all the things that were supposed to happen today. When I recalled the pressure cleaning that was supposed to happen today a loud expletive escaped my lips and I instantly knew what my course of action was going to be.

I put some clothing on and went out to talk to my roommate. I immediately admitted my broken agreement and took full responsibility for it. I apologized for the mistake and announced my intent to recommit. We renegotiated the plan to be exactly the same, just tomorrow instead of today.

I acknowledged the broken agreement, apologized for the inconvenience and set an expectation for what my future intentions regarding the agreement are. As long as the other party isn't determined to hold a grudge, this makes even complete failures turn into a win-win situation for all involved. And isn't that what we all really want? To be happy and relaxed and enjoy life.

The end of the tunnel. pt1

It has taken a long time to get here but I can finally see the light at the end of the tunnel. What am I talking about? Well,of course, that's a bit of a story.

When our group first came together, our vision included all living together for a few years, so that we would be able to pool our finances to pay off all our debt and eventually be able to buy homes for each of us.The key part there was getting rid of our debt and having a financial plan for success. For various reasons that turned out to be a whole lot more difficult to do than it was to say.

Our initial plan was to get the best mortgage we could possibly get with our credit ratings and to start paying off debt as quickly as possible. Due to the number of people we had, a five bedroom house was the smallest size house that could reasonably accommodate us. Because of bad credit and or bad work history, the best mortgage we could get was still a terrible mortgage. We had a first and second mortgage. The first mortgage was a  variable rate forty year mortgage that started at 8% and the second was a thirty year at over 10% . The plan was to make our payments on time and after two years consolidate the two terrible mortgages into one better hopefully around 4%. The idea was to work things in such a way that we would all live in the same house for seven years. During that time we would pay off all our debt and start saving money to buy more houses.

The exact time when we were eligible to refinance is when the housing crash happened and nobody anywhere would talk to us about refinancing. Around then is when the first mortgage company started changing our rates every few months and our bills started going higher and higher for no real reason. Our group went through a lot of painful change during this time. Very little was directly caused by our mortgage troubles, but all directly affected our finances.

I am the third of our financial managers. The first two were very difficult to get straight answers from about our finances. All we knew was that thousands of dollars a month were going into our group pool of money and at the end of the month we were always just above broke in our group account. There was no transparency. It was never clear whose contributions were exactly how much or how much each person was keeping for personal debts. People moved out and took their debt with them and still our bills didn't seem to go down.

When I took over the finances, at first, I didn't really have a plan. I was just so overwhelmed with attempting to keep up, that I wasn't looking far enough ahead to make a plan. I saw that we were still spending as much or more than we made a month. I realized that this pattern could not continue if we were to be successful.  So, I started taking steps to reduce our monthly outlay of cash. 

An opportunity came up to get rid of our 2nd mortgage for about five percent of what we owed on it. I snatched that up in a heartbeat and suddenly an extra $700 per month was available. I got a copy of everyone's credit report and made a list of who owed how much and prioritized who was getting paid and who wasn't. Basically any accounts that were still open I would pay. Any medical bills or things that were closed would wait. I looked for and found several ways that some bills could be consolidated. Some like our phone bill, I cut in half by switching companies.

Working together

I was listening to some friends playing an online game together earlier and through the bantering and bickering that was flowing back and forth it seemed that they were not doing all that well. They did manage to win the game, but only because they were playing against a remarkably stupid computer AI. Against real people their overall lack of strategy and tactics would likely have fallen flat. Just because there were several of them on the same team it did not mean that they were playing as a team.

What do I mean by this? At the beginning of the game they were all placed on the same team but they each had their own idea of what a good way to win the game was. And each was putting into play their own plan for how to make that happen. The problem with this is that their plans were mutually exclusive. Each plan called for each person to  be in a different location than the one that every other plan called for.So far we have not learned a way to be in two or more locations at once, so while any one play may have worked all of them together were bound to fail.

To work together as an effective team only one overall plan could be enacted. Elements from several of them could have been incorporated as long as they did not count on any one person being in two locations at the same time.

What should have happened before the game is that one person should have been selected as leader and everyone should have agreed to follow that person's instructions. It is not possible to have five different leaders on a five person team because you can only follow one set of instructions at a time. A team will almost always beat a group of individuals each doing their own thing.

One may not always agree with the plan and strategy of the leader but if you do not follow it, it can not work. It may not anyways, but if you do not follow the plan you will never know. If you follow it and it does not work, at least you are not to blame for the failure. Then afterwards you can take your turn as leader and show why your way may be better.By each taking a turn leading the team, you can find out who is best suited for leading the group. And if you each have an open mind, you can all improve your skills by learning from one another.

Also before the game started strategy and goals should have been discussed. To be a successful part of a team one must be aware of their role and what is expected of them before game time. Each person needs to know what is expected of them at any given moment. Knowing ahead of time how the game works and how the opponent is likely to respond in a given situation is good also useful. That way contingencies can be set up, on the fly, for the major changes that may need to be made to the overall plan, in order to ensure victory.

To sum up, being part of a successful team is about having a good leader, constructing a flexible plan, following instructions from the leader even if you disagree with them and most of all working together.

Today's Rambling

Many of us have a clear picture of how our life would be if it were exactly the way we wanted it to be. We know what car we would drive, how big our house would be, what we would do for a job, how many children we would have and dozens of other minute details of the perfect scenario. Yet our lives fall short of that perfect portrait. Why is this?

Is it because we lack the hope of things one day being that way? Is it because we do not really wish this image was our reality? Certainly not. But hoping and wishing are not enough to make our dreams come true.

What is it then that is missing? There is a bridge between the life we want and the life we have. And what is missing is the main tool required to build that bridge. Hoping, wishing and dreaming all accept the high probability that what we want will never materialize. Each of these ideas are too weak to make your vision manifest.

You need to close your eyes and imagine that perfect life of yours. Truly walk around inside your vision and revel in it. Exult in the moment of having exactly what it is that you want. Then make a decision. If this vision is what you want decide that you are going to make it real. Discard hoping, wishing and dreaming.

And in their place build a fire, fueled by the burning desire for your success. For desire is the tool that allows you to bridge the gap between where you are and where you want to be. There isn't really anything wrong with where you are right now. In fact it is the perfect place to start out, specifically because it is NOT where you wish to be. With the desire to create and make real your vision for yourself, you can compare what you have with what you want and begin to formulate a plan.

This plan then becomes the blueprint by which you live your life while on the journey to the life that you want. Along the way things will happen which have the potential to pull you away from your goals and to distract you. Friends and family will attempt to pull you into their own dreams for the future. This is where your desire for success becomes most important. You get to use your desire to overcome the distractions, to stay focused on the straight and narrow path. This does not mean that you should avoid interacting with others, just avoid letting their stories become your story. Some people will actually have useful insights, experiences and ideas that you can make your own.

The path to the life of your dreams need not be a lonely one. Just remember to only allow those around you that are supportive of your goals. And once you have built up the fires of that burning desire, take careful steps to always keep the flame going. It may be the plan itself that gets you where you want to be. But if your desire to see it through is not high enough, regardless of how good your plan is, you will never follow it.