What Lights Your Fire?

Do you ever ask yourself why some people seem to burn more brightly, stay fired up longer, bounce back faster, accomplish more and have more fun doing it? Like the bush that burned but was not consumed, they seem to burn the candle at both ends and come back shining brighter than ever before.

Let me guess, you’re thinking “those are the people who are really passionate”, right? I would agree the “fire” begins with passion, the wellspring of energy. In a previous post about tapping into that wellspring and understanding passion I explored the connection between passion and joy and suffering.

But at the end of the day what keeps your fire burning? What is the fuel? What gives it shape and direction?

Let’s try this one; Purpose.

From Latin, “pro” before or in front of and “posse” to put or place. Literally then “to place in front of”.

1. The object toward which one strives or for which something exists
2. The reason for which anything is done, created or exists
3. A fixed design or idea that is the object of an action

Conclusion; achieving your purpose requires that you understand your objective or reason and combine it with action or creation.

What do you place before anything else? What objective do you have for striving or creating or taking action? For that matter, what is your reason for being – for continuing to get up every morning and tackle another day? What is your why?

I’ve observed a lot of powerful people who are accomplishing great things (many of them are unsung angels but they still wield a lot of power for good) and the thing I believe they have in common is that they are living their purpose. Whether they have spelled it out in a mission statement or not the consistency with which they create and take action spells it out for them. They burn brighter, stay fired up longer and bounce back faster than your average angel.

About two years ago I started wrestling with creating my purpose statement. It has gone through several transformations and with each revision it resonated a little deeper and a little stronger. Today it acts as my blueprint against which I measure the things I create and the actions I take. I don’t always measure up, but when I do I too burn brighter, stay fired up longer and bounce back faster. I’m no angel – but I’m working on being the best version of my human self possible.

Here is my purpose:

First – To see the world become more connected; with their inner voices, with their best selves, with each other and with their world.
Second – To see people encouraged and empowered to define and pursue success in their own unique way.
Third – To help people stop saying “I can’t” or “you can’t” and begin saying “how can I” and “how can I help you make that happen.”

May your fire burn brightly and forever and may you always honor the fire that burns in every unique individual.

The Blog Stalker

When I first started exploring the idea of sharing my thoughts through blogging one of my networking buddies recommended that I visit the blog of a well known tech blogger. He made that recommendation because I said I didn't want to write about facts and events, I wanted my blog to be about ideas, notions and random connections and to invite people to agree or disagree but mostly to inspire them to think and challenge their own perspectives. It may seem odd that he thought I should read a tech blog but that was exactly the point - it wasn't purely a tech blog, it was a blog by a techie who wrote as much about the impact technology was having on our lives as she did about the technology itself.

But when I did visit her blog the last several posts weren't about technology at all. They were about her traumatic experience with a stalker. This person started with comments on her blog, progressed to emails, then to written letters. It started with derogatory raving and went to death threats and explicit pictures. It ended with her being under police protection and having to cancel an appearance at the Emerging Technologies conference, which, ironically, my friend and client Wendy Gauntt of CIO Services (read her humurous and informative tech blog here) attended.

I was horrified, I was sympathetic, but I wasn't scared. This stalker wasn't taking these actions because of anything she'd written, he was obsessed with HER. Therefore, I reasoned, this wouldn't happen to me. And it didn't, at least not to that extent. But earlier this month I found out there is someone out there who IS monitoring me through the internet, someone who pays attention when my name or company name shows up in new content, someone who is interested because it's ME.

It's freaky. My first response was to do some online searching, what kind of content was this person able to get to? (check out Wendy Gauntt's blog post about Twitter and Seurat's art - I think the minutia of our lives do form a picture.) My next response was to do some soul searching, how comfortable was I sharing my stories and random ramblings, not only with strangers but with this very interested party?

I quit writing. I second guessed everything I thought about writing. I berated myself for not writing, for my completely unreasonable response. And I asked myself a couple of questions; "What are you really afraid of?" and "How much of your life are you willing to surrender to fear?"

And then I second guessed the answers, but ultimately I got to the heart of it. My answers aren't the point, those weren't even the right questions. The right question was this: "How do I live a life that is not compromised by fear?"

Because we all have fears. Lots of them. We fear loss, failure, pain and death. We fear ridicule, loss of face, weakness and being alone. We fear being backed into corners, making promises we can't keep, not having choices, the list goes on forever. And all of our fears are reasonable because all of those things are possible (and some are inevitable extensions of living.)

Living a powerful life does not mean living a life that is free of fear, it means making your life choices regardless of your fears, building enough personal strength to have the confidence to face your fears and, every bit as important, it means surrounding yourself with enough nurturing elements that when the fear seems overwhelming you have a safe harbor to rest in until you are ready to set sail again.

So here's to reaching our destinations, regardless of shallow water, storms and sharks. The threats may be real but the prize is just as real and worth the risk!