“True faith is never found alone; it is accompanied by expectation.” – C. S. Lewis

My assistant likes to forward me pertinent posts that she gets from a daily inspirational email list she’s on. Today, I found this one sitting in my inbox.

Lewis was known as a Christian apologist, but that’s not where I’m going today. Today, I want to talk about the “expectation” part of the quote. Because as I sat there reading it, I realized how much of what we get out of life is dependent upon what we’re expecting.

I like to tell my coaching clients they need to “expect more to get more.” Expect better to get better. Believe you deserve something greater than your current circumstance and your brain (specifically the RAS) will force you to take action to change your situation.

Where are your expectations?

The key to this seemingly simple concept is the power of belief. When you believe something, it’s a deep, inner knowing. You just KNOW that something is going to happen, something is going to change, the hero will beat the bad guy. You just know. You believe it. You just know.

What is it that you know – you absolutely believe – about yourself, your life, your business? That’s the foundation to everything you’re building in this world.

If you truly believe your business and your life are amazing and life-giving, they are.

If you truly believe you’re a screw up, you are.

As Napoleon Hill said “Whatever the mind can conceive, and believe, the mind can achieve.”

This isn’t about mystical “Law of Attraction” woo-woo stuff. This is about getting your mind and your goals in alignment. I don’t want you sitting there day after day saying “I am rich and powerful” when you’ve got thirteen cents in the bank. I want you to be honest about where you’re at so you can start adjusting your course to where you truly want to be in your life.

Expect better to get better. Expect more to get more.

The problem with belief is that we can’t get there without faith. Faith in something. It’s the reason you’re so nervous when you first started driving lessons: you had no faith in your abilities. You believed that you could learn how to drive, and you probably also believed that you didn’t know what to expect when you started driving.

So, in a controlled environment, you began to learn how to do drive, acting in faith that eventually you would increase your skill and confidence to the point that you would one day be driving with your knees while you’re talking on your hands free cell and applying lipstick.

Faith made it possible.

You expected that you could learn and that eventually there’d be evidence of your competence.

It’s also why we don’t drive in a world full of auto-accidents. We genuinely believe that the drive coming at us will stay on his side of the road. Why? Because we’ve had enough evidence over the years to validate that belief.

Belief comes after validation. Faith is the seed that must be planted to take the first steps toward new beliefs.

Look at what you truly believe. Look at what you WANT to believe. Notice the gap and start looking for ways to provide your brain with evidence to close the gap. That’s the only way to create a new belief that sticks.

Here’s an example.

Let’s say you want to make a million dollars, but you’ve never even earned $50,000 in a single year. Don’t shoot for the million unless you KNOW it’s possible. Shoot for $50,000 first. That’s more possible in your mind. It’s more believeable. You’ve got a foundation behind you that says you’re more likely to achieve that anyway. Make that your goal, and as you get closer to it, inch up your goal.

Today, $50,000. Tomorrow, $75k. Next month, $150k.

Remember when you finally got that driver’s license? You thought you could take on the world, right? Autobahn here we come!

That’s what happens when your mind is in sync with your beliefs. You feel invincible, and you’re ready for a bigger goal.

Stop short changing what I call “pit stop goals”. You need them to build confidence and ultimately provide enough evidence in your mind that you CAN accomplish whatever you desire. Sometimes it pays to dream SMALL instead of thinking BIG all the time.

I learned this the hard way… but that’s another story for another day.

Scientists do this all the time. They create a hypothesis to test and then act in faith to test that hypothesis. If the evidence from the tests proves positive, they’ve got a new belief. If it doesn’t, they’ve disproven their hypothesis.

You can do this, too. Repeat after me:

“I think that I would like to (accomplish/have/be) ______. In order to do that, I would need _________. So I’m going to start collecting what I need to test my hypothesis, and track the results.”

Expect that there will be an outcome, but don’t make an emotional investment just yet in what the outcome might be. Emotional investments trap us in vicious spirals of doubt, anxiety, and fear. Just test it and see what happens. If it doesn’t work, then you know you need to try things differently.

Oh, and don’t start big. Start very, very small. The smallest next step you can think of. What is the very next step to achieving that $50,000? Maybe it’s making $100 this week (or $10 tomorrow). Start there. Start as small as you can to see what evidence results. Then keep testing as you go along. Keep the stakes low until you’ve built up a solid case of evidence in favor of your new belief. Then, momentum kind of has a way of rolling things along from there.

Questions? Think I’m up in the night on this? Share your thoughts in the comments. I’d love to hear what you think!

For as flawed as I acknowledge myself to be, I’ve always thought myself to be a tough ol’ bird.

Looking back, it appears I handle death pretty well: only a few tears at my brother’s funeral and nary a droplet at Grandpa’s.  I had a few snorting moments at Mom’s funeral, but you try handling back-to-back funerals. Add to that singing and delivering a eulogy at Mom’s funeral, and I came across as pretty strong and well received. My “emotional moments” were very justified, if a bit unprofessional.

The show must go on right?

Wrong.

The show can, indeed, come to a screeching halt. You can at any time throw your hand in the air, admit defeat, feel the pain, and call it quits.

You have the ability to change horses mid-stream, decide you want something different, and just up and leave.

You can walk out on your own life, if you choose.

But there’s a price you have to pay, one way or another.

Something happened the other day that reminded me that for the past 20 or so years I’ve only been living part of my life – part of my truth, as it were.

More on that in a minute.

Matthew West’s song, The Motions, is the “theme song” I selected to be my anthem for the year:

This might hurt, it’s not safe, but I know I’ve gotta make a change.

I don’t care if I break. At least I’ll be feeling something.

‘Cause “just okay” is not enough. Help me fight through the nothingness of life.

I searched for a word – a single word – that would encapsulate the idea of “going all in”, of living my life whole-heartedly, of burning my ships and living life the way God intended for me.

I don’t wanna go through the motions.

I don’t wanna go one more day without your all-consuming passion inside of me.

I don’t wanna spend my whole life asking “what if I had given everything instead of going through the motions?”

The word? Enthusiasm.

I wanted so much to fully live my life again. To really feel and enjoy and experience everything in the moment. I just knew that I had picked a perfect song and a perfect word.

Careful what you wish for. Because as I listened to that song one day, I became unhinged.

My new friend, Leesa Barnes, talked about the moment her hinge broke and what it meant for her. For me, the unhinging couldn’t have come at a worse time: my husband’s birthday.

On that day, it occurred to me that I have not been fully living my life for a good 20 years now. I’ve been “shoulding” on myself in ways that I didn’t think really mattered.

I walked out of my own life. I wish that the price was merely a pound of flesh. Try 100 pounds. And it ain’t flesh, baby. It’s pure blubber.

I’ve had an “emotional eating issue” since childhood. It didn’t really become apparent, though, until middle school. I’d say I’ve been struggling with it, or “dealing” with it for some time, but that would be a lie.

In fact, I’ve really not done much except enable it. I’ve kind of stood by, numb to most of the world, as anything remotely edible passed my lips in an effort to quell something that wasn’t happening like it was supposed to.

Mom yelled at me? Where’s the crackers?

Dad said I was putting on weight? Make a sandwich.

Date says I’m too fat to be seen in public? Have a can of soup.

Husband is non-communicative? Half a pizza should do it.

I was reading Marianne Williamson’s book as the unhinging began (yes, while listening to music.  I even distract myself in my distractions!).

I recognized how other people had encouraged my enabling. How other people tried to be nice when someone needed to slap my face. Not call me “fatty two tons” mind you, but wake me up to the reality that I was only symbolically insulating myself from whatever it was that was “hurting” me. Marianne was finally that person. Thank you!

When oysters get irritated, they use their body’s secretions to insulate themselves from the pain and create pearls.

When Lisa gets irritated, her body takes in more food than it can handle and creates blubber to insulate herself from the pain.

Which only causes more pain (can you see the vicious cycle herein?).

So I thought, in the sake of being “enthusiastic”, I’d be more mindful and really feel whatever it was that needed to be felt. To be clear, while I do eat for pain, I also eat for pleasure, so I’ve been avoiding BOTH for some reason.

Or should I say I WAS…

Because on that day, I made the choice to stare down the food, and figure out what it was I was REALLY feeling BEFORE I took a bite.

And that has made all the difference.

No regrets. Not THIS time. I’m gonna let my heart defeat my mind, let your love make me whole.

I think I’m finally feeling something.

‘Cause “just okay” is not enough. Help me fight through the nothingness of this life.

It hurt. A LOT. And I had to leave. I needed to get as far away from what I thought was causing the pain (and my refrigerator) as fast as possible. I also needed to find a way to resolve the pain. Not stuff it down or pretend it didn’t exist, but to feel it, and get over it. To grieve it and ultimately be a better person for it.

So I went to the movies.

And as I sat in the theater watching The Green Hornet (in IMAX 3-D so I couldn’t avoid seeing AND feeling it), I something I hadn’t felt in a good 20 years or so.

I felt IT.

Courtesy rdanderson.com

A feeling of youthful invincibility. That certain air of “Can’t touch this” that I used to get after watching heroes save the day when I was a kid. Like I was the hero, like I was imbued with their awesomeness just by watching the show. The last time I remember really feeling that feeling was when I was a kid, watching MacGyver on TV. I totally felt like I could fix anything after watching an episode of MacGyver (have you seen what I can do with duct tape and garbage bags?).

I realized how that part of me was subrogated for this funky, quasi-professional adult version of me that wasn’t anywhere near as exciting, fun, or talented as the “MacGyver me”. When that me started rearing her ugly head, the pounds started layering on. And yes, it started when I was still a kid – with all the “shoulds” that took me away from becoming my MacGyver me:

• what school I should go to?
• what I should major in?
• what kind of grades I should get?
• what kind of people I should hang around with?

It dawned on me how much I want that old life again – MY life. Not to be a teenager, but to have that youthful confidence about my own skills and abilities again. To stand strong in who I am and know that I’m serving God’s purpose for my life – regardless of naysayers and detractors. To stand on THAT promise, instead of the “shoulds” and “maybes” of some so-called “professional” existence.

So while I don’t plan to do any coffin jet skiing any time soon, I DO plan to spend more time living in my body. Living the life God has designed in his infinite wisdom, and being THAT person again.

Sometimes calling it quits is the right thing to do. If you need to quit something, Do it! I needed to QUIT quitting and start living.

So I am embracing my inner MacGyver, and getting back to being a badass.

You’ve been warned.

Photo Courtesy The Weinstein Company

His is a tale of reluctant heroism at it’s finest. Here’s a guy, born into nobility, yet he’s mocked, abused, and never given his due. He comes to not only believe the hype, but also produces a physical manifestation of his “worthlessness” by way of a stammer he developed as a toddler.

He has no faith in himself, and keeps praying beyond all reason that his brother David will see the light and let go of his “fantasy” relationship with this bad influence. But David has already accepted his call to live his own life. Albert must now become King.

Enter Lionel.

A man with no credentials, save the results he’s produced for a countless number of people with “speech defects”. No alphabet soup, no royal appellation, and in fact, regarded as unworthy to serve the King once his lack of official credentials is uncovered by the “royal attendants”.

As I watched the movie, I marveled at how two men from two very opposite ends of the social spectrum should ever come together.

And then the answer came: Faith.

A wife, determined to help her husband be the best he could be, simply would not rest until she found the solution to his “problem” – even against his wishes. Money was no obstacle, so why could Albert not over come this defect? She had faith that, somewhere, there was still one more stone to overturn. She found it in Lionel.

A teacher, determined to break down the walls built by a young man to protect himself from harm, simply would not acquiesce when told that this man was of noble birth. “My house, my rules.” was Lionel’s retort. His supreme faith in his own abilities left few in a position to debate the King’s choice to have him by his side for nearly every public address His Royal Highness ever made.

A king, forced into a corner, yet understanding his pivotal role in the “life” of his country, ultimately had faith in his own voice – a voice that would  assuage the fears of a restless nation as Hitler blazed a trail closer to their shore.

A country, longing for a protector, desperate for direction and unable to take heart in themselves, hoped for the best when their newly crowned king and well-known stammerer took to the wireless for his first-ever wartime address.

I was struck by the notion that being born into royalty doesn’t automatically make you a great man. And being a great man without a royal appellation doesn’t make you any less noble. When you aspire to greatness in your work, you will catch the eye of kings.

Scripture tells us that a job well done is rewarded richly:

“Do you see someone skilled in their work? They will serve before kings”

It matters not your station. It matters not your situation. All that matters is your focus, your conviction, and your willingness to do what’s right, whether or not you get credit for it. Lionel could have easily slipped into obscurity as an “unqualified” humiliation, at the behest of the court, but his skill and persistence won over a doubftul King and a desperate Queen.

And ultimately, an entire nation would have him to thank for the voice of their “fearless” leader.

But in the annals of history, who gets the credit for the impressive speeches? Certainly not Lionel. It was the king that spoke those words into being.

Yet, it was Lionel that spoke The King’s Speech into being.

According to the film, Lionel earned high distinction for his service to the Monarchy. Not bad for an uncredentialed, yet highly skilled “speech defect” coach.

You are where you need to be right now, doing what you need to do right now. Your credentials (if you have them) are meaningless. It’s your results that people care most about. So stop worrying about what you don’t have, focus on being excellent with what you DO have.

The rest will come in time.