Are you at your best right now?
If not, when were you last at your best, and what’s changed?
Having observed myself working, and often attempting to work for many years I can absolutely confirm a correlation between being at my best and results, financial or otherwise, feeling good, efficiency, effectiveness. My ability to influence, to be creative, to inspire others all happens when I am operating at my best, at all other times some of all of these outcomes elude me.
I’ve also noticed this in most of the people I have worked with, as a coach over the last 10 years. They visit ‘at their best’ for a few hours, a day, perhaps even a week or more and amazing things happen. They experience breakthoughs, crystal clear perspective on topics that were once hazy, performance increases, in others around them too.
So why would we not want to be at our best all the time?
Well you can be there significantly more often than you might be experiencing now. Firstly, it’s a choice, a concious and determined choice. Based on the belief that you are at the controls of your life and performance, no-one else, and not the victim of the contexts in which you find yourself. Second it’s about becoing aware of who you are when you are at your best, what are the circumstances, what has lead up to this, and so on, in as much detail as you can identify. Then thirdly it is about creating the context everyday in which you can be at your best.
Here’s a suggestion, coined by my masterful coaching friend Kate Duffy. Complete the sentence:
I’m at my best when ………
Re-visit this often, then notice what the ingredients are, and put them in place.
Good luck and ask me for more.