by Guest Writers Suzie Cheel & Des Walsh
"Luck is when preparation meets opportunity"
Seneca,Roman philosopher, (5 BC – 65 AD)
On our morning beach walks we often see surfers getting ready to ride the waves. Typically they go through a number of limbering up exercises and yoga style stretches and poses.
One exercise is swinging their arm and bodies from side to side as in the photo. So they will be ready to seize the moment when that great wave comes along and ride it as far as they can.
In business we don’t always know where opportunities are coming from. We need to be mentally flexible and alert so we can recognize opportunity when it comes and to be able to act on it decisively and effectively.
What exercises do you do to be prepared to meet an opportunity when it arises?
Suzie Cheel and Des Walsh
I find the key to flexibility is to always be mentally in the game. First thing upon waking, take a walk, clear your head. Then throughout the day see everything, even the small things as potential opportunities both in business and in life. Every stranger you meet could be your next partner, or a friend for life. You meet people for a reason, even if it is short lived. Take nothing for granted, everything is important.
One thing I do is to start the business day by taking a quiet minute at my desk and asking myself, “I wonder what new opportunity I’ll discover today?!” It always makes me smile just to think it. Then I get on with the day. Somehow, that small seed I planted gets my unconscious into gear – it always seems to pull something forward!
I’ve also been using the Holosynch meditation system from Centerpointe. I’ve noticed my intuition is sharper and I see more opportunities around me. It’s helped me expand my world.
That is wise said by Seneca. Sometimes I’m so proud that I have Latin 😀
@Jay great advice: and we can learn from others we may not see again.The other day in the doctor’s waiting room a man was riffling through the magazines and finding nothing he liked: I asked “what sort of magazines would you like?” and was vastly entertained for the next 30-40 minutes with tales from the long career he’d had as a surveyor. I learned a lot and it was a more fulfilling use of time than reading magazines from 2007 about the famous and vacuous.
@Erica Your comment reminds me of a great exercise I learned from the sales and personal development expert Brian Tracy, to say in the morning and repeat several times, with enthusiasm, “something wonderful is happening to me today”. It’s a great setup exercise and you spend the day on alert for wonderful things, which then have a funny way of manifesting themselves.
@DutchSchoolKid agreed, but I suspect we are becoming a rare breed 🙂
That’s correct, when you are not chopping the tree, you should spend some time sharpening the axe.
Here are a few things that one should regularily do to keep herself equipped for the opportunity:
1. Read
2. Write: Even if you are not good at writing, its good to take notes of your ideas and learnings.
3. Network: Keep your social/professional networks alive and growing.
Great question. What am I doing to prepare for opportunity. So many miss that preparation is the key to being lucky!
Thanks for sharing this thought.
@tojosan