I’d known him for 7 years when, in 1995, I hired him as my “partner-in crime,” and my intellectual sounding board. Officially he was a consultant on an internaltional venture.
That week he’d introduced me to my counterparts in the UK — 23 meetings in 10 days. After the last meeting, he suggested a leisurely lunch on the next day, before I left for Heathrow. . . .
We’re close friends, but I didn’t know about lunch.
Finally, I said, “Only if you show up. I don’t want to see the guy who’s been with me all week — I want the person I know.”
Lunch was at a small bistro. The fruit crème brûlée was spectacular. The wine was wonderful. The conversation was even more than I’d hoped for.
My friend had one way to be in business and another in real life. I suppose that’s not so uncommon. . . .
But that doesn’t mean it’s the best way. Does it?
Steve Farber, was working for Tom Peters way back then. Now he’s a leadership coach and author of Radical Leap and Radical Edge, a two-book narrative on extreme leadership and personal growth. He’s got words for what I was thinking and where I want to go.
In Radical Edge, the characters — Steve, himself, is one — call what I’m thinking of finding your frequency. They say these things about it in a scene over dinner.
“The first thing we have to do is find our frequency, find our station, the one thing that clearly expresses who we are at our core.”
“You have no business, no money no life without yourself right at the center.”
“I don’t know how much of that I could have accomplished if I hadn’t found my frequency.
Steve wrote the book, and he questioned the idea, “Human beings are more complicated than than that.”
He got this answer.
“Yes they are, But it’s not about finding your frequency by ruling out everything else; on the contrary, it’s about finding the frequency that includes all those other important values and ideals. The very act of trying to wrap it all up is what’s really important, because in order to do so, you have . . . define them, think them through, understand them to their core, and evaluate your life against each one.”
I can’t quit thinking about how much sense that makes. It’s the extreme added-value of relationships to really “show up” at the table. It’s the “authentic voice” of leadership, of being who I am I could argue that it’s what my gene pool was designed for.
Talk about finding a way to make a life, change the world, and have no regrets that you’ve used what you’ve got.
If you know what you value, you value what you have to offer.
I’m tuning out the static, to home in on my signal.
Can you hear me now?
Is this better?
Imagine what we can do when we can actually hear each other.
Really, Liz — I think this is important….
It’s about becoming “fully human”
Well said, Katie. Well said.
Happy Friday Liz!
This post is a great self-esteem booster. Thanks for the kick off to a great day and weekend.
Hi HandsOff43!
It’s a Friday post for sure! I’m delighted you find a great start to your weekend. Enjoy!
Nicely put, Liz. You hit it right on the head with “can you hear me now?” If the answer is “no” it’s probably because I can’t hear me now. Once I get that clarity–tune in to that signal–I’ll be clear to others, too.
Thanks for exploring “frequency” with your readers!
Hi Steve!
Welcome! What fun that you came to visit!
Thanks for pointing out that you have to be able to hear you before you can hear me — goes both ways naturally. But I wouldn’t have come to those words yet without you to say them.
I’d love to know whether you stayed with the word that you started on. 🙂
Finding your frequency. What a great image Steve came up with! If you’re on your frequency, if you’re working from your center, not only can you hear and communicate more clearly, your life will resonate, giving you more ability, more energy to do whatever your are doing.
Hi Rick,
Yeah, I know exactly and can hear every word that you’re saying.
I read his second book over a month ago and I’m still thinking on it and just couldn’t wait any longer to share it with all of you. 🙂
Imagine what we can do when we can actually hear ourselves. When we take time to turn our attention inward and get centered, we increase our self-awareness – we get in touch with our true Self. It is then that we can express a consistent and authentic Self in the world.
Whoa Kirsten,
What a valuable point you make. What if we turned off our cell phones and unplugged ourselves just to reflect? Imagine that!
Wouldn’t that be something! We have a culture that focuses on the external – I think we forget how to unplug… then we get all the static because people aren’t acting from their authentic Self (frequency).
Yeah, it’s sad really. We’re losing a richness and depth, but books like Steve’s and blog’s like yours are letting us know the value of getting it back.
There’s a reason that people play golf and garden. It’s more than what appears before the eye. 🙂
Great sharing! I am in tune and receiving at the same frequency from the remote island of Mauritius. The extinct DoDo is even on the same wave length.
For years, I have practiced to get my whole body & soul to be in the same frequency:
through Meditation.
Reconciling :work&personal,the positives & our inner negatives,leading & following, old & new, They & me….the yin & yang. Is it ,all about Balance?
Hi Joseph,
Welcome!
Meditation, reflection, inner thinking, we could use more here . . . could you send some please. 🙂
We’re still learning.
I too have a totally differnt way of dealing in the Business side of things and in Life, you just have to sometimes. I do apply some of the personal attitudes in the business arena as well as I think it really helps.
Alot of people fake a persona in business life, and it just doesn’t do much good, it eventually destroys that true personal self you had.
I’m young 😉 So still learning the balance, wax on wax off et al
Hi Techz,
The thing about changing who you are for business is that
It’s easy for it to become the same as learning to do things for approval.
Ahhh… balance! Balance is a beautiful thing!
I think golf, gardening, walking in nature, etc. can all be used as a way to tune in and get in touch with ourselves. In fact, if we can maintain a present moment focus (mindfulness) we can stay in tune and in touch with our Selves and go about our business.
Hey, Kirsten!
So can taking the time to breathe . . . ahhh.
Yes… and that is what I am off to do… breathe and my daily meditation. Thanks again for providing such a great conversation.
Sounds like a great idea!
Liz, I read “The Radical Edge” too (I’ve got a review on my site). What I love about Steve’s approach is that he “amps up” (to use one of his terms) the whole concept of being a leader (hence his use of the words “Extreme Leader”) to include self-actualization (like finding our frequencies) and life path and purpose. He dreams big for us, and gives us the tools to get to those dreams. We need to get him to our convention in the spring, don’t we? 🙂 All the best.
Hey Starbucker,
He sure does dream big for us, but we do a pretty good job of dreaming for ourselves too, don’t we, though? 🙂
It sure would be fun to have, Steve join us in Chicago in April. Hmmm have to see about that1 I love having a dreamer like you on our convention planning team. 🙂
I love dreaming big dreams. I know it makes some of my non-dreamer friends crazy. They say things like “didn’t you say last year that you were going to do this or that?”
They don’t get that some of the dreams show up as pieces of other dreams along the way. And even the ones that don’t work out (or don’t work out as quickly as I might like — because who knows that they won’t ever work out?) are so much fun while the dream lasts that I wouldn’t want to do without.
I think progress is fueled by dreams.
Hi Katie,
I agree.
Progress is fueled by dreams and dreamers take risks. If we listen to our dreams, somewhere in our absurb imaginings is the spark of genius.
What I think is weird (but I’m too polite to ask them about it) is why non-dreamers feel so superior to dreamers. I heard that tone of superiority in their voices again and again. Like they they think that they’re rooted in reality and I’m on another planet.
I’d think they’d feel jealous of my freedom …..
Maybe they do, Katie, or maybe they disapprove. We’ll never understand. Steve might say they don’t hear their own frequency, so how can they hear yours.
I have to go to a meeting now . . . I’m going to hear Lyle Lovett’s frequency tonight. 🙂
Have fun…Wish I was there (grinning)
I’ll listen for two!
I think it’s as simple as this, Katie: People who don’t allow themselves to dream don’t have much to live up to; therefore, they’re more likely to meet their own (lower) expectations of themselves. And–perversly–that can feel like “success.” On the other hand, if you dream (especially out loud, as you seem to do) it gives others the chance to say, “Aha! There’s another thing you didn’t do.” The dreams that you do accomplish, on the other hand, will be your true legacy. A legacy that they will rarely or never achieve for themselves.
Steve, I think you’re right.
It’s only recently that I’ve accepted the dreamer aspects of my personality. And it took realizing that (as you said) all my accomplishments started as dreams. And that I’d be nothing, absolutely nothing if I hadn’t had them.
I could have done more I suppose (and if my dreams come true, I will) but without my dreams I’d still be testing gravel for highway construction. And that would be a drag.
This has been a fun conversation.
Katie,
You are so wonderful at bringing out the best. Your frequency has something to do with being fully alive and sharing that.
I wonder whether some who don’t allow themselves to dream are just afraid . . . and have been taught not to.
So many folks to day don’t know how to play or have fun. How could they have a glimmer of how to dream? They’re feet aren’t grouded — they’re feet are stuck in concrete. It’ takes time to chip that off and show them that not only “creatives” are creatives and not only “dreamers” dream.
Gustav Hoslt who wrote “The Planets” wrote
“What the mind yearns for most is not to know, but to believe.”
At the time he wrote that, therre were 5 planets.
When I found it in college there were 9.
Now there are 8.
Good thing I believe I can visit the universe in mind whenever I want — just to go see. 🙂
Good Morning Liz!! (I actually slept all the way to 8:30, so this should be one of he best for me.)
Liz, what you said (about me) is just about the nicest thing anyone’s ever said. Thank you very much. And because I subscribe to the comments here, it was the first thing I saw when I woke up this morning. (and maybe THAT’s why this day will be one of the best!)
(ah, coffee’s done!)
And what you said:
Is an important lesson and so true too. Because I think you’re right, creating and dreaming are habits that can be learned. We always talk about “the American Dream,” I think we’re in danger of losing not just the dream but the “American Dreamers” as well. Maybe dreaming should be taught in school — I bet it wouldn’t be that hard to teach or learn.
You’re right, Katie.
It’s not hard to teach someone to dream or to be creative. The hardest part is to get the person to believe that they already know how! Our brains are wired for it — we have four hemispheres and two specialize in that stuff. Some of us have just closed the door and don’t pay attention anymore.
Actually, I think some of the people I was thinking of (way, way up there in an earlier comment) have slammed the door and locked it up tight! And I think they’ve been disappointed by their dreams — maybe something they REALLY wanted didn’t or couldn’t happen. And I can sort of see how that could happen.
But not dreaming is self-destructive to your future. Because change can’t happen without a dream, can it? So if you close that door on them, aren’t you dooming yourself to staying in the place you’re in (I say doom, because even if the place you’re in is great — is it the place you want to be in 20 years?)
And, by the way — your frequency is really exciting.
The problem with shutting the door on bad experiences is that a person shuts the door on the feelings that surrounds them too. Then the person never really works through and gets to use those feelings again — they’re stuck with a smaller skill set.
I wonder how you would define my frequency. . . 😛
I don’t know that I’m ready to define it. I just know I always like to tuning into it!
I have to admit the music on this frequency seems to be pretty good. 🙂
Speaking of music, how was the concert last night?
A couple of years ago, I crashed and burned from exhaustion in a job that was all too willing to suck whatever it could out of me. I didn’t recognize myself…didn’t see the traits that had set me on my career path several years earlier.
I started working with a coach and one of the first things we did was a value assessment, then an assortment of other self-assessment exercises. I learned that what I was doing…and the work situations I continually put myself in…were striking a painfully discordant note with what I valued. I was not only on the wrong frequency, I was on a frequency that, by nature, I wasn’t capable of hearing.
The clarity I regained led me to redefine my job and work with managers to reassign some of my responsibilities (ones that I was tired of, or had simply been henpecked into taking) to people who I knew had wanted them for quite some time. I rewrote my resume, dropping off some things that I’d done (and done well) but didn’t enjoy and didn’t want to be called upon to do again — I guess you could say I redefined my personal brand. I walked away from some long-time relationships that were long past their expiration dates…and new friends with similar interests quickly appeared in my life to fill those empty places. I decided what I wanted to be known for, and shaped my subsequent career and personal decisions accordingly. I found volunteer work that allowed me to marry three things I like to immerse myself in — writing, technology, and animals — and explore new things like blogging and Squidoo. The work there gave me the courage to go after a gig as a regular columnist for a newspaper. On my old frequency, I would have found none of these things.
It would be difficult to briefly quantify the mental, emotional, and physical changes that came as a result of finding and STAYING on my frequency. It starts with finding, understanding, and owning the values and ideals that are important to you. If you value creativity and innovation, why work for a corporate bureaucracy that values conformity? If you value stability, is freelancing really the way you should go? If you’re really passionate about art and design, why are you still in accounting?
If you don’t know what you value, it’s difficult to ascertain why your current situation feels like it doesn’t “fit” you. If you don’t have the money to visit a coach — or are just a self-motivator — there’s lots of tools out there you can use. Some are simple, like the MI inventory at http://www.ldrc.ca/projects/miinventory.mitest.html. Others, like the Meyers-Briggs personality inventory, are more time-consuming but highly useful. If you’re willing to spend a little money ($15), check out Curt Rosengren’s “Occupational Adventure Guide” at http://www.passioncatalyst.com (his blog has lots of good stuff too).
Clarity may be closer than you think…
Wow, Whitney!
Thank you! That is a gift for all of us to hear
But it’s a gift to me especially today when I was thinking of a question that needed answering and wondering exactly what words I might use. Your voice came through loud and clear so that I could hear my own.
Thank you. 🙂
Glad I could help, even if inadvertently. It’s simply me making lemonade out of lemons. Talking about my hard-learned lessons keeps me from veering off course again. If talking about it helps even just one or two other people, then it was all worth it.
What a great post, Liz. I’m a huge Farber fan, and have enjoyed both of his books immensely. Finding one’s frequency is a big issue right now (which explains the success of Rick Warren’s Purpose Driven Life). I work with my students and my clients to push them to that stage where “what if” collides with “what is” (i.e., frequency). Some are already there. Some are held back by paradigms, fears, and other constraints (many self-imposed) and take months or years to get there. I surround myself with positively charged people who know my frequency, as well as there own, and we know when to help each other with course corrections… it’s a blessing to have them in my life.
Hi Timothy!
Thank you!
I’m a huge fan of Steve’s too! I’m a huge fan of anyone who’s got a handle on knowing that life’s about knowing who you are and listening to what folks are trying to say. It’s important.
Fear does so much to get in our way.