Are You Seeing All Your Opportunities?
I’m sure I have talked about this subject before, but it came up again this week. You sometimes don’t see what is right in front of you. Like when you suddenly start seeing the particular brand, make and colour of car you just bought all over the place, where before you bought the car you hardly ever saw one (even though they were there all along).
Sometimes things happen that don’t fit into what you thought the day/week/your life was going to be like and therefore you don’t see the opportunities therein. On the face of it, it might look like a problem, or it might look like an opportunity for someone else, not you.
I remember a conversation I had once with a CEO of a large company. He was telling me about his son and daughter who left University within a year of each other. His son was talking to him about a job he had seen where he had about 50% of the criteria required for the job, and how he felt sure it was the right opportunity for him. He could see himself in the role and he was sure he could pick up the remaining skills on the job.
The following year he was having the same discussion with his daughter – and he had spotted a great opportunity for her, doing the exact type of role she was looking for. He asked her had she heard back from them yet with an interview.
She told him “Dad, I haven’t applied for it. I only had 8 out of the 10 things they were looking for”. Of course, he told her how things actually work in business and referenced her brother (who did actually get the job he had only 50% of the criteria for). She applied. She got an interview. I believe she ended up getting the job.
Interesting eh?
She didn’t see the opportunities which clearly lay in front of her. Whereas her brother saw a clear opportunity where there might not really have been one.
When I joined the Professional Speakers Academy 6 years ago, or was it 7? I knew this was my opportunity – but I had no real basis for that. I mean I was working. I didn’t have a business. I wasn’t a speaker and I had no idea what I was going to use my newly acquired speaking skills for.
I just did it anyway, because it felt like something I should be doing. It felt right. And now – I get to have weeks like the one I am having right now. Last weekend I was speaking at an event in Manchester Airport – a conference about living your dreams, for women who want to start their own business.
The next day I was coaching public speakers at #SpeakersUniversity. On Thursday I was speaking in the North East at an event centred around mental strength. And on Saturday I am the host and main speaker at Grace the Stage in London – an event designed for women who want to be speakers.
If I hadn’t been open to the unknown opportunities that joining the PSA was the catalyst for, then I might have seen that investment as a cost. I might have focused on what I wasn’t (good enough, not a business owner, who am I to think I could be a speaker etc), and not what I could be. And if I hadn’t made that decision – then all the opportunities that come my way every week would have been like the cars you never saw (that were there all the time).
Where are you not seeing the opportunities that are passing you by every day? Sometimes it helps to have someone – like my client did with his daughter – pointing out the opportunities you have and encouraging you to take them.
That’s why I am on my mission, to help 10 million disheartened souls who are at a crossroads to stop asking ‘Why Me?’ And start saying ‘Why Not Me?’ through the Find Your WHY Foundation. Find out about our membership here.