When you come across inspiration, you should share with the world, and I feel inspired. Last weekend I attended the Best Year Ever Blueprint, hosted by Hal Elrod and Jon Berghoff-from the Achieve Your Goals podcast. For almost four years now, I’ve listened to the Achieve Your Goals podcast and found inspiration from the stories and lessons shared. When Hal does deep self-reflection, it touches me in a way that encourages me to feel like I could be willing to do the same for myself. Being in the room, however, to hear of the struggles Hal continues to work through, as well as inspiring messages from speakers over three days, has been transformational. Hal’s ability to be as positive as he is-is one thing. To be immersed in a community of motivated, goal-achieving people who lift each other and inspire my journey is the realization of an essential value of mine and inspired five crucial lessons about what surrounding myself with a community in line with my values looks like in action. Being the average of the five people I spend the most time with received an upgrade.
Being Around Inspired People
It feels really good to say that for three days, part of my responsibility was to be happy, smile at over 500 event attendees, and be myself- helping them feel welcomed into a new environment. Since 2015 I’ve applied advice from the Achieve Your Goals podcasts, beginning to figure out my direction, and the opportunity to volunteer with them at this event drew a strong desire to give to a community that has given so much to me. Being around people from countries around the world, sharing similar messages of love and positive results through action felt like an environment foreign to my day-to-day working space.
Hearing about who this community surrounds themselves with, why they do, and why they focus on talking about their relationships was incredible. Not focusing on work or business, but about friendship and accountability. When I was growing up, nobody I knew went to anything like this. Witnessing over 500 people giving love to a man who is beating cancer and going through a difficult time still was a beautiful expression of love and gratitude for another that I feel this world needs. Seeing this worldwide community come together really reinforced what giving unselfishly can bring when you find your mission in life.
Acting on My Values is Changing My Life
The course of my life has found a new level that feels like aligning values and living my dream. Sharing my results with Hal and his community felt like the least I could do.
Finally, feeling the confidence to trust myself, understanding that I have more strength and ability than I give myself credit for, and lifting others along their journey- are resulting actions exposure to this community has encouraged developing and sharing that felt natural. As part of the 35-person leadership team, we also exchanged something called “praise cards,” giving each other on the team complements and acknowledgments for what we saw each other doing. Feeling inspired to live as my best, especially at the Best Year Ever Blueprint, I began to really notice that living my values is playing out in ways that people are actually responding to. I am grateful to have received cards sharing feedback from those watching what I’m doing. This event has left me feeling closer to achieving the primary goals I’ve set for myself than I realized.
After this experience, I feel inspired to give my best effort to continue developing connections into the deeper meaningful relationships my life values and to reconnect with those I met last year. Meeting a lot of people makes it very easy to and lose touch once events end. Still, the investment into these relationships is to surround myself with others that provide accountability that develops consistency.
We Discredit the Importance of Small Victories
I learned a fundamental lesson on the third day of the event when we spent two hours discussing goal setting and our relationship with the goals we prioritize achieving. We discredit the importance of small victories and overemphasize failure if we do not achieve results fast enough. If results don’t appear immediately, it can be misinterpreted that our slow rate of success is a sign of failure.
If I’m going to take goal achievement to another level, then the time is now to figure out how to do the little things that will continue my progress one step at a time. It’s OK if it takes any amount of time to do it. It just has to be done. The one thing that I need to do to take my blog seriously, and to take my writing seriously is to learn how to do it.
As F.M. Alexander once said, “People do not decide their futures, they decide their habits and their habits decide their futures.”
The Importance of Asking, “What if?”
I’ve never thought of asking myself what results would occur if I don’t show up to my commitments or as my best self in every interaction. Asking, “What if?” during this event turned on the light for me and helped begin to understand consequences if I don’t put one foot forward and follow through with pursuing my mission to help one person. I see the opportunity for a lost soul not to ask questions that could provide clarity in their lives as to what they wanted, or worse, not understand the direction they’re heading, and if they even really wanted to. At BYEB, I began to feel the weight of what the phrase “happy wife/ happy life” meant to me, especially during my divorce. I realized a common thread in my life of internalizing a story that what I wanted didn’t matter. That story was part of my surrendering of dreams I had. Asking myself about who I help and how sharing my best work has impact left the question of “What if?” one I am not willing to realize. Those feeling lost in their lives like I did, struggling to be their best, and communicate what they need in their relationships will not be alone. I will show up for you.
If I’m going to have my Best Year Ever and raise my level of integrity to take action and do these things, there’s going to be follow through on a level I have not lived yet. Knowing that leaves no doubt that 2020 Will be my Best Year Ever!
Who are you surrounding yourself with?
I had conversations with Hal Elod this weekend. He hugged me twice! I told him that his looks at himself inspired me to define my values and that his podcast had an impact on my life, thanking him personally. Getting to tell him this face to face was me taking seriously the surrounding myself with five people of such character, influence, or perspective. Going from listening to his podcast to standing next to him… who I’m surrounding myself with is getting real. And it’s simple to do. I had to follow through with what I wanted. I felt I had to take some action, and attending this event was also a realization of another Bucket List goal of mine. Still, I’m getting chills now thinking about it.
I also met Jon Vroman, the host of another podcast I listen to, the Front Row Factor. The Front Row Foundation is a charity he started for people going through their darkest times end provides them the front row experience to the favorite event and provides a memory that will last a lifetime. Serving adults and children, this podcast inspired me to live the moments I have from my front row as best I could. Not specifically that I need to be in the first row, but if I could put myself in the best possible position to be part of experiences while I have the opportunity. I’ve even made that part of my mission and to encourage others to live front row moments of their own. His messages helped me appreciate being in Florida even though being there drove me nuts a lot of the time.
Getting around motivated people and being part of conversations was bringing golden nuggets of information. Spending five days around people who are living high-level philosophies and discussing principles from books like “Winners Never Cheat” was encouraging to see from successful people in business. The focus was not on scarcity and fear, but on love, gratitude, and the abundance of options of how we could help the world.
You can do this!
If you find inspiration from someone at such a meaningful level that when you apply advice they give or a lesson they learned to your life, and you have a positive result- would you take the initiative and find your opportunity to stand beside them and embrace them with gratitude? The Best Year Ever Blueprint was such a meaningful experience that I feel a strong need to advocate being around a community in-line with your values. Or, at least begin the journey to finding one within whatever level of your comfort zone is. From 2015 until now, my comfort zone looks a lot different than it used to, so don’t discount progress. The results of my life are showing that steps do, indeed, add up.
Who are you surround yourself with? It doesn’t have to be every day, but if you find ways, and you find days-each one of them will count.
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