You Are Not Alone on Your Pathway

CREATE YOUR OWN BOARD OF DIRECTORS

Big ideas need big minds. One thing that is really important in all adventures is to include your Creator in this process. The Creator has more intellect and more creativity than any human or computer. Getting the Creator on your side and trusting His guidance is essential. Having your own Board of Directors begins with the Creator. The Creator is the Prime Director of your personal, and virtual, Board of Directors

INC. YOURSELF!

Think of yourself as an enterprise. You have assets, valuable skills, you have a vision, you have strategic objectives, and you have specific values that shape your focus, and you have liabilities. You need a network of people who can mentor and advise you. Find people you know and admire who have skills and attitudes that can support and encourage you. These people may have their own goals but they might also have time to provide needed advice. They can be of any age or any background; they could even be in the Great Beyond. They can have similar or different education and experience. The key is that they encourage your effort. Stay away from those who are nay-sayers, those who want you to stay where they are! They say—who are you to think that you could make a difference? You are just a kid, just a girl, just a mom, just a .... Those people are not worthy of being your advisors. They may even be family or clan members. Find someone else!

Investigate your pathway and anticipate what pitfalls and challenges might be ahead given your person set of skills, values and attitudes. Where might you be overreaching, and where might you not have the knowledge to make you successful? Sometimes you might even need to include a marketing person in your team — and sometimes you might have to pay for that expertise. This means you have to be willing to invest in yourself. 

ACKNOWLEDGE THE MENTORS IN THE JOURNEY

Not all of these “Board of Directors” have to be physically present to help you! One of the things that I did early in my career was to find the person who I thought had the best approach to finding work and planning careers. It was Richard Bolles, who wrote What Color is Your Parachute. I found that he was teaching a seminar on his book at a small college in Nebraska. I invested in myself, and paid for the seminar and then invited my dad to fly me up there, which he did, in his commercial plane. From him I learned the meaning of this principle: Find a Need and Fill It. 

CONSIDER THE PEOPLE WHO MADE A DIFFERENCE

Here are some examples of virtual board members in my life:

• Several of my professors who made a huge difference in my life.
• A variety of spiritual leaders from different traditions,
• The leader of a movement that helps people live healthy and balanced lives,
• A person who has incredible faith and energy and has implemented change in her community,
• A landlady who helps her tenants with her social worker skills.
• Someone who has un-stoppable energy that has led her to make a political difference in her community.
• An engineer who created gadgets that enabled robots to explore the surface of Mars
• An explorer who travels on uncharted roads, and creates his own path through the mountains on land and in life.
• Two young women who bravely stepped out to create their own businesses far away from home

Several of these people have overcome incredible odds to get where they are. People in my own family have been mentors and members of my Board of Directors (and they may not even know it!) Sometimes, helping other people with their projects (i.e volunteering for non-profits) can build skills and help you give back at the same time. I have lifelong relationships with many of the people in these non-profit endeavors. 

KNOW WHEN TO LISTEN

Your Board of Directors does not have to come to meetings, or be paid. They don’t have to have a presence on your website or your tax return. The big thing is that they need to be listened to, and appreciated—by you! People who share ideas with you do so to help you. They are busy, they do not have time to hold your hand, but you can watch what they do and how they do it. Those are the people you take with you as you follow your path. What they have taught you will stay with you: you learn how bravery works, how faith works, what it means to be strong, creative, financially secure, and how to overcome obstacles. They can also teach you how to accept recognition and how to extend your reach into new areas where there might be a need. Recognize the people who are already in your life who provide the mentoring and the inspiration to help you along your pathway! And best of all, since they care about you, they may also warn you when you are overreaching, or coming close to a cliff.

These people are the “we” and the “us” in your achieving milestones. You cannot get where you are going without help. So when you Inc. yourself, remember those who are there and have always been there to help you!