It's not you, it's me!

“It’s not you. It’s me!”

Some days it just feels like nothing is working out. Everyone you try to call is out. People keep cancelling appointments. Your car breaks down. You drop your favourite coffee mug. You bump in to a lamppost. And some days everything just seems to flow. Every meeting you attend is vibrant and useful. Just as you are about to call someone, that person calls you. You hit green lights all the way home. Someone brings you a doughnut!

Is it just the difference between good luck and bad luck or is there something else at work here? And, if there is another power at work, how can you harness it to become more effective in your professional and personal life? I’m not talking about God or the equivalent by the way. Simply that when you are feeling good, things seem to go well. And when you are feeling less good, things seem to go wrong.

A possible theory
I believe that what we see happening in our lives is a reflection of something we need to address in ourselves. For instance, if people are constantly letting you down, it’s an opportunity to ask yourself “How reliable am I? Do I need to raise my standards? Or do I need to change my expectations?” If you keep bumping in to things, falling over or getting speeding tickets, it’s a good time to ask yourself “Where is my attention focused?” If life seems like a struggle, you could ask yourself “What changes could I make so that things became effortless?”

So, it’s all my fault then?
Not at all! You aren’t making these things happen (if only we had the power to do that!). But instead of blaming everyone and everything else (which is a waste of time given that you don’t have the power to do anything about that either), the more useful approach is to see what changes YOU can make. What are the messages behind what’s happening to you? What is within your sphere of influence?

How does this make you more effective at work?

1. Get back in control
Whether you run your own business or work in a larger organisation, there is plenty that is outside your sphere of influence (The “sphere of influence” refers to those events you have some control over). The first step then is to identify what is within your sphere of influence.

Draw two circles, one inside the other. The outer circle represents everything that is outside your control (where the police choose to put speed cameras, people being out of the office when you call etc). The inner circle represents everything that is within your sphere of influence (the times you choose to call people, how you choose to respond to them being away from their desk).

Now you can focus purely on what is within your power to control. By taking control of the things that you can influence, and letting go of the things you can’t, you start to change your luck. (Thanks to my colleague Katie Rowland for that one!)

2. “Act as if”
Pretend you are someone who lands on their feet every time. Consider how someone like that behaves. Consider how you behave when things are going well for you. What changes can you make to your behaviour or attitudes if you “act as if” everything is going fantastically well?

3. Learn your lesson
Ask yourself what life is trying to tell you. If you keep breaking things or tripping up, do you need to focus more on the moment rather than being lost in a world of your own? If you are staying at work late every night because of an ever-increasing workload, do you need to look at your boundaries? If your team doesn’t seem to listen to what you say, is it time you started talking less and listening more?

The only way to change your results is to start doing something different. So experiment with different ways of doing things until you start getting the results you want.