Interesting day last Thursday as we reworked the premise of the PEOPLE Academy, Inc. Started through revelation or an aha moment from Toni that turned into a two way brainstorm and then a four way brainstorm to move us into a position of service, rather than product.

At first I was slightly alarmed that we were abandoning what we had been working on, and then I realized it was more a perspective than a reality shift (in a way.) We had always been about people and helping and that’s why the Get Inspired! Project was such an ‘overnight’ success while we sort of struggled a bit with message on the PEOPLE Academy, Inc. Not that they weren’t both really about the same thing, but that how we were internally digesting them was different. Does that make sense? In my head it does and if you have questions, feel free to ask. It would help me (and us) with focus, so don’t hesitate on that.

But the purpose or focus of this blog entry is The Completion Backward Principle, which is both a Tubes album and a way of making dreams come true. Which one would you like to hear about. OK, I’ll talk about the Tubes. Fee Waybill is an amazing singer and the music and lyrics of the Tubes are misunderstood and inspiring. What? More on the dream thing? Oh, alright.

We did some ‘imagineering’ (yes, stolen from Disney, although I would guess it will eventually be as generic as jello) and threw all of our ‘hows’ out the window. We talked about dreams for where we wanted the business to go and where we wanted our lives to go and all that sort of happy stuff, and we got some really cool ideas up on the boards. Then we discussed reality and what we could do to make the dreams come true. Some things were just tiny tiny steps. Thinking of the ‘reality’ also made us realize that some of the dreams weren’t ‘out there’ as far as we thought and that we were already making some significant steps toward the dream goals. Some of the steps were as simple as writing an e-mail and maybe the response would be a huge step.

So where is the Completion Backward Principle? We are starting at the finish line and knowing we are going to get there. Feel it and hold it in your heart. You are running across the line arms in the air. Everything is present tense. Hold that tightly in your mind. It is a done deal. Fait accompli. Fin.

Now retrace how you got there. (I’m a runner, so this is a running analogy, bear with me) Your last day of training you might run ten miles. The week before you ran 5 miles three times. The week before you ran 4 miles twice and 3 miles once. Maybe the week before you did.. well, you get it. Ten weeks before you bought new running shoes. Eleven weeks before you stayed in instead of eating out at lunch so you could put money aside for the shoes. Retracing your steps back to today. Now execute the plan. You know the conclusion, so you just have to go through the steps with passion and you know it will happen. The conclusion is foregone. Bingo.

Now apply this to your dreams. Do you want a new job? What is that job? What training or education do you need to get it?

I read a story where a woman was complaining that she always wanted to be a doctor. She went to a work counselor. (One who believed in dreams) and told the counselor of the dreams. The counselor said “go for it.” And the woman said, “well, by the time I’m done with medical school I’ll be 46.” The counselor said “how old will you be if you don’t?”

That’s the point. Dreams don’t have an expiration date. Passion doesn’t know that it’s Monday. Build it, and they will come. Build your life and believe in yourself. Start with the outcome and then figure out the how. Don’t let the “how” shoot you down.

recommended reading today: Creating Magic: Leadership Strategies from a Life at Disney

Two non-connected but connected events just occurred in my life. I exchanged a couple e-mails with Jim Stovall who wrote the book, The Ultimate Gift, among many others. You know how everything is connected and it’s a small world and all that other stuff? Well, it is a small world and we all are connected. One of the interviewees mentioned The Ultimate Gift, so I ordered it through our library system and read it in like an hour or so.

Then I decided to contact Jim and ask him to do an interview for the project. He agreed. He’s an amazing man and you can read about him here.

But here’s the other half of this story, he is blind and has been since his late teens/early twenties. His vision just faded away. But his vision grew, and that’s the kicker.

Your vision for what you want in your life is totally between your ears. It has nothing to do with anything around you. Do you have things blocking your success? Only if you let them. Do you have people who discourage your dreams and your drive? As the Barenaked Ladies say “If there’s someone you can live without, then do so.” This goes doubly for negative forces. It is much tougher to build yourself up if you have a wrecking crew around you tearing you down.

Building the Get Inspired! Project and being involved in the PEOPLE Academy Inc is not the easiest path that I could go down, but the rewards are amazing and being around people who have my back is the best part of the whole deal. Great things can come from ‘normal’ people who have vision and cling to it tenaciously. Hold on tight and don’t let anyone tell you what you can’t do. (and that includes those voices in your head)

An interesting article on CNN talked about how some people viewed being laid off as something close to a gift. That is really coincidental, because in one of my other blogs I said that the ax didn’t fall on me, it fell on a tether that was holding me down.

The challenge remains in the realm of time management. This is my second go round with trying to manage life without a job. I can reflect on the last time and see how I let the freedom of self-employment rule and I let the real opportunity to succeed slip through my fingers. This time I can see something similar, but I know what I have to do and it all has to do with managing my time.

An excerpt from a PEOPLE Academy Inc bulletin on time management:

Time management is a way of life – it affects our lives both at home and at work. Each one of us is responsible for our own time management. It is heavily influenced by our attitude. A positive attitude will affect the quality of how we experience time and our attitude will affect those around us, who in turn influence the effectiveness of our time management.

The advantages of good time management:
• You achieve control over your activities rather than them controlling you
• You start to achieve a work, life balance
• You develop a proactive lifestyle rather than a reactive one
• You can deal with most problems as they arise
• You will reduce stress
• You will have time for others both at work and at home

All of those points apply just as easily to self employment as anything else. Don’t let the freedom distract your drive. In my opinion, focus and time management are the keys to entrepreneurial success.

Oh, yeah, the link to the CNN article.

And here’s something else to help clarify goals and targets.

is that title to grandiose? It’s my hope that it is true, so I will leave it.

I think back to a couple months ago when Toni first proposed the Get Inspired! Project. The initial thought came from going to see the movie Julie and Julia and focused on inspiration. We all thought we could add to the amount of light in the world by focusing on how people thought about inspiration, what inspired them and who they inspired (or thought they inspired)

What I think escaped us was the impact the project would have on us. I think specifically on Toni and me, especially. How is it that we didn’t see how contacting and interviewing these folks would impact us? I mean how empowering is it to contact someone and have them agree to an interview and have them very grateful to be a part of something that was only recently just a thought in our heads?

conducting the interviews has had many aha moments for Toni, I know that’s true, we’ve talked a bit about that and how the project is so much more than we anticipated, but I didn’t know my search for people would impact me so much. It’s crazy to think that world leaders and people on the leading edge of thought and inspiration are so in-tuned with what we are doing. To get a response back from Janis Ian or Noam Chomsky just humanizes the entire world. We are all just people and we all are looking at the same things and having similar dreams and everything.

And to have someone  ‘unknown’ speak a few words, a mere 15 minutes, and that impacts hundreds or thousands of people. Amazing. The Internet has linked us and this project is just one small example of the good it can do We’ve had over 1100 unique visitors and over 65,000 hits in 18 days with no publicity and no marketing except word of mouth. we have some big hitters coming up soon, and they will add light and power, and that in turn shines the light on all the virtual unknowns who deserve exposure. I am blown away by the potential.