Prompts that make me think about productivity seem to come out of anywhere…This one is from a scene - one quote, really - from the movie: The Bourne Ultimatum.
Early in the movie, Jason Bourne is being chased by Russian police officers. When Bourne turns the tables on one of his pursuants, the officer says, "Please don't kill me."
Bourne replies,
"My argument is not with you."
I watched this movie sitting in seat 6D, flying with American Airlines JFK to LAX. I pressed the pause button, took out my journal, and started writing; that quote was so powerful in the moment.
Reflecting on it later, and adding more ideas to that page in my journal, I’m reconsidering the arguments I have been a part of lately. Also, I’ve been thinking of WHO I have been arguing with. And, I’ve got to say, I need to make some changes…
The arguments we have, and the people we have them with will create your reality. How much you get done. What you dream about. Where you take your company. It all depends on you having the best, most focused, most productive conversations (aka: arguments) possible.
I'll share with you the (2) arguments I I’m having this week, and the (1) person I’ll go argue with next.
1. Argue For My Routine:
What got me here…got me here. The routines, the habits, the “comfort zone” of what I do, when I do it, and how I do it has created the results I’m experiencing. I recently met with a mentor (the CEO of an investment bank in New York City) and spent 40 minutes questioning and qualifying my routines. There are some benefits to working comfortably.2. Argue Against My Routine:
Now, as another mentor of mine (Marshall Goldsmith) says, “What got you here, won’t get you there.” For over a month now, I’ve been switching one routine up at a time. (Each time I do this, I experiment with it for 5 days.) It’s obvious to me that the “next” I experience (next client, next contract, next product) may require that I look at things differently; that I do things differently. Here are my two most recent 5-day experiments - I’m going to keep them going…
Write a thank you card first thing when I get to my desk.
Read a minimum of one chapter of a book (any book) before I fall asleep.
3. Argue With Myself:
My most important role as a CEO, a co-founder, a husband, a community member is to identify my own “raison d’être” and live my “Why?” to my fullest potential. It’s my job to clarify the most current version of the best vision of my life. What I am experiencing right now IS the result of the most recent (and most clear) vision I had created. Sitting here, I’m arguing with myself about these two things:A) Was the vision I had then what I want to be living now?
B) Am I willing to re-vise what I used to think I wanted? To dream even bigger?
Jason Bourne was beat-up, bloodied and sleep-deprived and knew very clearly who his argument was NOT with.
In order to do that, he had to have done the pre-meditation necessary to have some kind of a filter. He had a vision of what he wanted true, and took massive action after massive action to make it so.
How about you? Are you ready to argue and create a life of purposeful engagement?
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