How to Increase Your Focus

John Maxwell:
Foreign.

Mark Cole:
Welcome back to the Maxwell Leadership Podcast. This is the podcast that adds value to leaders who multiply value to others. My name is Mark Cole, and this week, John Maxwell is sharing a lesson that’s all about what to focus on during challenging times. John says it like this. He says traction is always good, distraction is always bad. But let’s go back to what we’re talking about today is how to increase your focus, and specifically how to increase your focus during difficult times. And yet, isn’t it true in difficult times, distractions reign supreme, and opportunity and focus sometimes seems hard to find. So John’s going to teach us.

Mark Cole:
And after John is teaching this lesson, my co host, Traci Morrow, and I are going to come back and we’re going to dissect what we heard John say, how we are applying what John says. And we believe we’ll give you some things that you can apply to your life and your leadership as well. If you would like to download the free bonus resource for this episode or watch this episode on YouTube, go to MaxwellPodcast.com/IncreaseFocus When I’m done today, I want you to stay in because I’m gonna introduce you to one of our listeners that also said this. I have applied this lesson talking about a previous episode, and it is making a difference. I want you to hear the difference that he’s making because I want it to inspire in you to leave us a comment as well, to maybe ask a question so that we can continue to serve you and add value to you. So grab a pen, grab some paper, get a way to take some notes, because John’s going to help, you know, how to increase your focus. Here is John.

John Maxwell:
Challenging times cause us to be distracted. One of the side effects of going through difficult, dark times, challenging times is that we get distracted very quickly. And we get distracted because what we’re looking at isn’t seemingly meeting the need. And so we kind of move around and say, is there something else that I should be doing or thinking or practicing in my life? And so challenging times just. There’s a relationship between tough times and being distracted. You know, traction is always good. Distraction is always bad. You know, traction is the positive side attraction.

John Maxwell:
When somebody has traction, it means they’re moving forward. Okay. Or they’re pulling as a team towards something. You know, in fact, why do we hear the phrase all the time? We’re gaining traction, we’re gaining momentum, we’re. We’re making progress, and that’s always a good thing. You want traction. But as soon as you put the dis. The dis in front of it.

John Maxwell:
It’s the opposite of traction. And so distraction, instead of pulling toward a stated goal that you have, you start to pull away from it, and you’re not going where you need to go. You’re losing traction. You’re not progressing. In fact, distraction, really, it’s a bad thing if you pull away from where you’re wanting to go. It’s not a good thing if you pull toward where you want to go. It’s traction. It’s a good thing.

John Maxwell:
And what happens is in challenging times, we kind of lose our way with priorities. And so this lesson, as we’re thinking about distractions and how do you focus? Well, one of the ways you focus is you put a lot of stuff behind you. You can’t look at a dozen things and stay committed and good to them. You’ve got to get rid of a whole bunch of. You got to put a bunch of stuff behind you so you can put the one thing or two things before you that are really going to make a difference. So how do we maximize and get the best out of a challenge year? Well, what I’m going to teach you is I’m going to teach you five things that you need to put behind you so that those things no longer distract you. And I’m going to give you five things you need to put before you that you focus on that are going to really enhance you and help you. So let’s get going.

John Maxwell:
Here we go. How do we choose what goes behind and what goes before? Number one, here we go. Put behind you what you can’t do, because there are times, especially when they become difficult, that you’re not able to do all the things that perhaps that you really wanted put behind you the things you can’t do and put before you what you can do. Now, this is huge.

Traci Morrow:
Huge.

John Maxwell:
And don’t get the two of them confused. If you start bringing things that you can’t do during a difficult time in front of you, you’re getting frustrated and you’re going to quit and you’re going to be greatly discouraged. Now, listen to me very carefully. During difficult times, people freeze up on what they can’t do. You got to let that stuff go. If you can’t do it, you can’t do it. There’s a difference between a problem and a fact of life. A problem is something you can fix.

John Maxwell:
A fact of life, you can’t fix. It’s a fact of life. So if you do what you can do, it’s only a matter of time till some of the things you can’t do, you’ll be able to do, but you can’t do them. First you gotta do what you can do. You gotta get what you are in control of right now and do it. So I want you to put before you what you, put behind you what you can’t do. Put before you what you can do. You got that? Let’s go to number two.

John Maxwell:
This is good. This is really good. Number two, put behind you fear. We gotta reduce fear. We can’t get rid of it. I mean, we all have a little fear in our life. That’s not the issue. We need to put it behind it, so we reduce it.

John Maxwell:
So put behind you fear and reduce it and put before you courage so you can expand it. Because courage is the great activator. Courage allows you to act. And when you act, good things happen. Fear is exactly opposite. Fear immobilizes you. Fear makes you stay right where you are. Well, I’m not going to move until I know what’s happening.

John Maxwell:
And I’m not going to make a decision because I don’t yet understand. So fear, fear deactivates you. Courage activates you. So put before you courage. Put behind you fear. And what happens is courage is the activator. Courage gets us moving. And you’ve heard me talk about, so I don’t need to talk about it today.

John Maxwell:
I talk about action, attraction, that when you and I take action, we attract people through that normally wouldn’t see us, but we’re moving so they see us. We attract ideas, we attract opportunities, we attract resources. I mean, it’s the action that is the attraction that draws things to us. If you are a person that says, I’m going to wait and let life come to me, life won’t come to you if you say, well, you know, I’m not ready. Well, it’s okay to not be ready. But you understand when you’re not ready or you’re always getting ready to get ready, but you never are ready if you’re one of those. I, I’m not there yet. Just understand, neither will be all the opportunities, the possibilities, the resources, the people, the money, everything that you need, you have to take action.

John Maxwell:
It’s the only way that happens. How do you get out of the people pile? Take action. Why is there so many people in the pile? Because it’s a pile. Nobody’s moving. They’re all piled in there together. They’re kind of doing a little Kumbaya security kind of deal. In the people pile, you have to put courage in front of you, put fear behind you, and all of a sudden you’re gonna begin to see good things happen. Yes.

John Maxwell:
Even during highly difficult, highly challenging, tough times. It’s very simple. Where did you place fear in your life? Where did you place courage? Wherever you place them, they’re gonna occupy your time. And remember this, if you place fear in front of you, it’ll distract you. If you place what you can’t do in front of you, it will distract you. You’ll never make progress. Okay, number three. Number three.

John Maxwell:
Put behind you intensity. And put before you consistency. I think intensity is overrated. I think consistency is underrated. Listen to me very carefully. This is very important. Consistency compounds over time, and that’s what you want to do. If you’ll do consistency, you’ll find a little bit of the main thing.

John Maxwell:
Every day will take you a long way versus a lot. For a few days will take you basically nowhere. So I’ve been leading for 55 years. I’ve been writing for 45 years. And when you become consistent, it reinforces your vision, it reinforces your values. If you’re persistent, you will get it. If you’re consistent, you will keep it. Don’t miss that.

John Maxwell:
Persistence will get you something. Persistence and intensity. Oh, boy. I got it. Okay, you got it. Good. I’m glad you got it. But only if you’re consistent will you keep it.

John Maxwell:
If you’re not consistent, whatever you had, you’ll lose. And there’s a whole bunch of people, they get it, but they never keep it. And they get it because they were intense, but they don’t keep it because they were not consistent. You see, momentum is a result of many pushes. Not one push. Nobody ever got great momentum with one push. You have to have many pushes. You just keep pushing and you move it a little bit and just a little bit more.

John Maxwell:
Many pushes equal momentum. That’s how you get it. And excellence is a result of many practices. You just keep practicing and practicing and practicing until one day you say, I’m getting good at this. Not just one. One practice won’t get you there. One push won’t get you there. If you’re going to have more than one practice and one push, you have to be consistent.

John Maxwell:
Intensity is not enough consistency. So put before you. Put before you. Consistency. Put behind you. Intensity. Number four. Number.

John Maxwell:
Number four. Put behind you. Complaining. Okay, just get that behind you, would you, please? And put before you. Gratitude. You can’t moan and lead at the same time. So you Gotta make a choice. You can moan and not lead or you can lead and not moan.

John Maxwell:
But nobody ever got inspired by a moaning leader. But gratitude, gratitude is absolutely huge. It is the difference maker. A few years ago, Margaret and I took our kids and grandchildren back to Hillham, Indiana for their 50th anniversary. Fifty years from that time, I had built that church, a little country church on three acres of land. And we took them back. We said, we told the kids, we want to show you where we used to live. Well, where we used to live was on the second store, on the second floor of a store that was on the first floor where all the stuff that happens where you have a grocery store moves around and they all came up to our floor.

John Maxwell:
We had a lot of company on our floor. Kids, I know where we live now, but this is where we used to live. Yeah. Let me show you where your mom had three part time jobs so that we could at least so I could be a full time pastor. Let me show you the jewelry store she used to work. Let me show you a couple of the houses she used to clean. Let me show you where she taught kindergarten for half a day. It’s a gratitude experience.

John Maxwell:
You go back and you remind yourself and see again what happened in your life that you just say, wow, look how much I’ve developed, look how much I’ve grown. Look how much better I am today. Number five. Put behind you who you were and put before you who you will become. Wow, I love that. Put behind you who you were. Put before you the person that you are becoming. Because during difficult times, during challenging times, the most important lesson we learn are the things that change our life.

John Maxwell:
And the answer of all of our growth is almost always out of difficult dark days. And the takeaway, very simply is don’t count your losses, count your lessons. So many people, they count their losses and they don’t count their lessons. We all have losses, but it’s not the losses that make the difference. It’s the lessons we learn from the losses. And remember this, you’ll learn more lessons in your losses than you will in your wins every time. So the question we have to ask ourselves is, where am I going? You’ve heard me say before, you have to leave something to go to something. Well, what I want you to go to are those five things that I want you to put before you.

John Maxwell:
Because if you put those five things before you, you’ll focus on them. If you focus on them, they’ll get bigger. And if they get bigger, they’ll helps you so many more ways in your life and put behind you all that other stuff. Those are distractions. Quit turning around and reaching behind you and pulling up one of those distractions and say I’m going to let that enter my life again. Put behind you all that junk that was yesterday. Put before you the growth that you’re having, the lessons that you’re learning, the person that you’re becoming. Go there, go there you go.

John Maxwell:
Grow into the next level.

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Mark Cole:
Welcome back everybody. It was Jack Welch that said a good leader remains focused. Controlling your destination is better than being controlled by it. Today we are, we’re talking about increasing your focus and how to stay focused and yet increase that focus during distraction times. And I think John kind of has already had a mic drop. He’s told us what to put behind us, what to put before us. I hope you took notes because John definitely helped Traci and I and we’re just going to take some time, Traci, and talk about how he’s helped us. Glad you’re on today.

Traci Morrow:
Yes. Yes. I love this lesson. I’m so happy to be here on this day talking about this lesson with all of you as I think all of us can relate this statement that he kicks off with challenging times cause us to be distracted. And boy, isn’t that true. I think all of us can relate. We all led through Covid. We live in a time of in some places, civil unrest in the world, political unrest, global unrest.

Traci Morrow:
Shoot, the weather is unpredictable. That’s not even mentioning what’s going on in our family. Families. Maybe what’s going in in our private lives, in our, you know, the barrage of negative news. I mean there can be so many challenging things, decisions that we have to make the things that are going on in our lives. I think he sets the tone right off the bat. And I think we can all agree that we are in challenging times and we all need this lesson.

Mark Cole:
Yeah, you know, it’s interesting. Go ahead, Tracy. No, well, I was going to say it’s interesting. The law of timing with so many lessons. And that’s exactly what you’re saying is in this. Whether it’s post Covid reality, whether it’s a particular challenge that you’re going through, what this lesson is telling us is the level of distractions that every leader faces day in and day out is sometimes it feels insurmountable, yet you put challenging times on it. And then the distractions not only become that much greater and it becomes easier to chase the distraction because the challenge has got us off of our focus.

Traci Morrow:
It’s so true. It’s so true. And I want to share a quote that I just heard this weekend that just popped to mind as it was talking. It was one of our pastors, Josiah Javier, said, disciplines, disciplines aren’t meant to fix me, they’re meant to form me. And that just really, you know, these situations are just life disciplining us. If you’re a person of faith, it’s God disciplining us. And not in a bad, bad way, like we’re in trouble, but it’s helping us to discipline our lives in the midst of the chaos around us. And that can be, we can view it as a bad thing or we can view it as something that can really become a treasure for us.

Traci Morrow:
So as I listened, I made two columns and I put behind and before. And I don’t know how your brain works, but that’s how mine does. And I put behind things I can’t do. And then on the other side, I put things I can do. And so I hope you printed out the bonus resource because he also has it written out in there, too. But I just like to see it in two little columns like what not to Do, Tracy, and what to Do. And I have to say when I am under pressure and I feel like at first I’m doing pretty good. You know that old John Wooden quote that John quotes so often? When opportunity knocks, it’s too late to prepare.

Traci Morrow:
I feel like what bubbles up is the work that I’ve done. And then pretty soon I have a good attitude. I’m all in. I’m checking all the boxes on the what, what’s before me and the things John says to do. But. But if the timing is not in the timing. I want it to be in very quickly. I can find myself jumping over to the what not to do column.

Traci Morrow:
I have fear set in. I feel myself getting more intense and trying to control the outcome because the timing isn’t happening as quickly. And so every list, I complain. I look at who I was before, and I liked that better. And so I’m just curious, Mark, what of these five on the bad side, on the things that we’re supposed to leave behind us, what are the five that you fight against most when you’re. When you find yourself in challenging days?

Mark Cole:
Oh, it’s absolutely number three. Put behind you intensity, and in front of you, consistency. You know, I’m a top. One of my top. One of my top values is passion. Well, passion is the maximized size, the minimized size. The difficult side is intensity. And so the less control I feel, the more intensity I exhibit.

Mark Cole:
I don’t feel the stress of anxiety or fears very often. I’ve been through a very tough time, a tough spot in my life, financially, relationally, spiritually. And so it’s almost like that helps you with the fear, but the sense that I still can control the outcome and change the timeline and shrink the challenge is a real struggle in the way that I do it is I put so much intensity to my leadership that it wears me out, much less the people around us. My intensity sometimes wears me out.

Traci Morrow:
It is so true. And so because that’s the one that you choose, I’m certain that leaders everywhere can feel that I call intensity and passion. Like intensity is the underbelly of passion. Like every gift has an underbelly and kind of like a lizard, you know, beautiful back of it, has the colors and the stripes and the beautiful markings, and then there’s the underbelly of it. And so I think most leaders can. Can relate to the passion versus intensity. And so how do you change. Flip that script? And John talks about starving your fear and feeding, you know, feeding your courage.

Traci Morrow:
How do you flip that switch and. Or the script and lean more into, you know, consistency instead of. Of being. I know you said you don’t deal with fear, but instead of dealing with intensity and control issues, instead putting that all into something positive like consistency.

Mark Cole:
Well, so I have to ask myself in my leadership often, maybe more often than a. A different leader, but for me, I have to constantly make sure I’m not leading from a place of emotion. And I have found that passion, enthusiasm is very contagious when it is in motivation, but when it is in response to Something that I’ve lost control of, that intensity, that emotion, I don’t think is effective. And so when I sense myself dealing with the angst of a loss of control or the angst of things coming into my world that I don’t have a good handle on, I have to really work to remove the emotion. Recently I was expecting a document from a partner, and I didn’t know what to expect from the report that I was going to get. I wasn’t really attached to one way or the other on the report, or at least I didn’t think I was. And so I get the report and Traci immediately, not two hours later, not two days later, immediately I read this report. And it wasn’t even that I wasn’t expecting what was on the report, but somehow the flow of the report, the results in the report, and the significance of what it meant reading that report.

Mark Cole:
It was almost like you hear the people that go up in fighter jets as guests or whatever, and they get them up in the stratosphere, tell them to close their eyes, and they flip the plane and they’re on the back or on the belly or on the side flying like this, and they say, where do you think we are? Upside down or right side up? And. And you got your eyes closed and they go, I don’t know, but I think I’m right side up. Nope, we’re upside down. Oh, what do you think we are? Right side up or upside down? I think I’m right side up. No, we’re sideways. You lose orientation. Now, this particular report, I lost my leadership orientation immediately. It was unexpected.

Mark Cole:
I didn’t think the report could contain anything that would cause me to lose my way like that. And yet I found myself as a leader in a fog where I couldn’t tell right side up, upside down. So what did I do to your question? I spent almost 10 days removing the emotion, uncovering why did that put me in a fog so bad? Why did I lose my orientation? Because this report, I had to really go unpack why that thing gave me that report before I could even process the or why that gave me that. That emotion before I could respond to the report. Here’s my point. I think when you, when you put behind intensity and emotion, the sooner you can do that, the more clarity you can give and show that consistency that all the people that’s looking to my leadership needs. But you can’t do it until you remove the emotion. And for me, you put behind the intensity so you can put in front of you the Consistency, this is going to be okay.

Mark Cole:
And it’s when I started telling myself and others, hey, this is okay. This is good. That consistency, that lack of emotion, really made a difference for me.

Traci Morrow:
I appreciate you saying that. It took you 10 days because you know how John always says, you know, you take a day to celebrate and you take a day to lament, but then you pick up and you go on. I hold myself to that so many times. But the reality is we’re human beings with emotions that sometimes don’t go away in 24 hours.

Mark Cole:
Yeah.

Traci Morrow:
And. And the reality is you’re trying to put it behind you and, and you. But you still can’t just shove it down and not deal with it. You have to, in a healthy way, deal with it. And sometimes it just doesn’t go away in 24 hours. I can’t always deal with it in the way that John Maxwell advises to do it, because some things feel bigger, some things knock you off your feet, and you just really have to give it the attention that it needs. Not too much attention, but in a healthy processing manner. Was there a healthy process that you went through to share, or was it just time?

Mark Cole:
I can give you a good process Trace is such a good question, because I can give you a process that works. For me, the example that jumped into my mind that I just gave, there was no process that worked. It was literally time and over time and a lack of continued intensity. What I do often is if it doesn’t happen quick enough for me, if I don’t get oriented quick enough, and I know people are waiting for me and looking to me for leadership, I double intensity. Hey, if intensity didn’t work at first, let me try a double portion of intensity. We call that. In John’s world, we call it the Maxwell hammer. In my world, we call it the coal hammer.

Mark Cole:
Hey, man, if pounding the nail is not working, I can know something. Let me pound it harder, you know.

Traci Morrow:
Sledgehammer.

Mark Cole:
Yes. You know what? If a regular carpenter hammer is not going to work, certainly a sledgehammer will work. And so what I did this time that worked for me is I did not double down on the intensity. I just rested in the perplexity. I just rested in the fact that, hey, this right now is not clear for me. And that’s okay. So everybody just get out your patience because I’m going to wait this one out. There’s been very few times in my leadership that I can give the example that I’ve just given where the only solution for me was time and Removing the intensity in it, which was for me, removing the emotion in it and just saying it will clarify for me.

Mark Cole:
And I will spend time in my way of getting clarity, which relies on my faith. I will spend time getting clarity before I react or respond. Too often, we as leaders put an unrealistic expectations on ourselves. We make matters worse by trying to force clarity rather than to allow clarity to materialize. And for me on that one, I don’t always do that. A lot of times, boy, I’ll bear down, I’ll remove myself from everybody. I’ll get focused, then I’ll go vet it with my mentors and I come back with a plan. No more than 24 hours.

Mark Cole:
I mean, it’s God forsaken if it’s 48 hours. But this time I remove the emotion. I removed the condemnation. I did not go further with my intensity and just let time and again, a couple of ways that I have as spiritual disciplines to help me get that clarity that I needed.

Traci Morrow:
I really appreciate you taking the time to say that because it’s almost like for an intense person, a type A person, and having John Maxwell in the back of your head saying that voice, we’ve heard him say it a million times. You take 24 hours to celebrate, you take 25, four hours to limit, and then you move on. And sometimes that’s an, that’s as a rule, but that’s not every single time.

Mark Cole:
Right?

Traci Morrow:
You can’t say to a broken arm, heal.

Mark Cole:
Yeah, exactly.

Traci Morrow:
You know, it takes the six to eight weeks in a cast or whatever to heal. And some things, you can’t just will it. You can’t will yourself to grow. Some things take time. And I love how you said you rested in the perplexity. We can’t force clarity. I, I just, I wrote that down. I hope some of our podcast listeners who are type as who try to force your broken arm to heal in a week or in a day needed to hear that.

Traci Morrow:
Moving to the next one. Complaining, put behind you complaining and put before you gratitude. I feel like this is not something I’m, I’m a pretty grateful person. I’m a positive person. I’m not a complainer. Excuse me, but I feel this year has really. I’ve had some leadership challenges in my life that have really tested that in. Especially as I said before, it, things didn’t happen as fast as I expected them to, as I wanted them to, as I willed them to.

Traci Morrow:
And so I found myself doing the next two complaining because of a variety of things. And, and then not liking that side of me. It’s a side of me I never visit. It’s a side of me that doesn’t come up very often and not liking it even as I felt the feelings of complaining. And so I just started to have, you know, practices of ignoring that on purpose, putting that to the side and not giving vent to that and gra. Having more moments of gratitude. Are there exercises that you have, Mark, or things that you. Where you practice counting what you have to be thankful for?

Mark Cole:
Yeah, for sure.

Traci Morrow:
Whether things are going good or whether things are going poorly?

Mark Cole:
Yeah, for sure. And let me say this, Traci. I’m going to talk about the things I do to make sure I keep gratitude at the forefront. I really am. But let me key on a couple of things that you said right there. Oftentimes we feel the complaining within us and what do we do? We put it to the side, as you said, or we ignore it. Oftentimes we just, hey, I can’t be complaining because as John says, you can’t moan and lead at the same time. I can’t be doing this.

Mark Cole:
And we suppress it. We pretend it’s not there or we sit it to the side. That’s not what John said. He says you gotta put it behind us. I have discovered. I don’t know if this will help you or not, but it’ll help some of us. I have decided putting it behind for me is dealing with the fact that it really is there. For years in my leadership, I pretended that there was never a negative bone in my body and I never found a place or a way to put it behind me.

Mark Cole:
I’ve worked hard over the last two years to find a place where I could just complain and feel safe that it was going to stay right there so I could put it behind me and truly move on. Often I put it away, which means it was not behind me. It still kept pinging me back, pinging me back. And I found a way for me to put it behind me was I’ve got a very safe place, a couple of very safe relationships to where I can just show them the Mark Cole that just don’t like X, Y or Z. And I cuss and moan and complain and let it go. And then in 10 minutes, 5 minutes, 2 minutes, I go, hey, now that I’ve said all that, let’s go. We got work to do. That for me is putting it behind me.

Mark Cole:
Putting it aside, not admitting it is only punting it down the field for it to come back when I can get it out, get it exhausted in its emotion, and then be challenged to. Now that I’ve said all that, can we move on? Now that really is putting it behind me. And now I can get into gratitude. Oftentimes I was faking gratitude because I didn’t allow myself to feel frustrated when I allowed myself to feel frustrated. Get it all out in a very safe environment. Now I’m ready to move on in authentic gratitude. Not fake it till you make it gratitude. And I don’t think fake it till you make it gratitude work, because it’s not really gratitude.

Mark Cole:
It is a task rather than a heart. For it to be a heart, you got to get the mess out so that the gratitude can exist in your heart. Because John’s right, you can’t moan and lead at the same time. But I believe if you don’t find a place to moan, you won’t lead for long because it’ll keep festering and it’ll keep coming back. So how do I do this gratitude thing? And for me, it really is a gratitude journal. It is a real intentionality. When I’m done complaining in my safe environment, when I’m done, I absolutely have to find just as long to find things to be grateful for as I complain. So, Mark, if you want to move on, you better moan quick because you’re going to have to express gratitude just as much time, and that doubles the time before I can move on and solve the problem.

Mark Cole:
So you know what? I did this whole story that I was telling you guys about of this report that just kind of put me in a real. Took me 10 days. Took me 10 days to just. I don’t know what to do. I can’t complain. So do you know what I did? I took 10 days to be thankful for where I was, to even consider a report like that. I spent just as many days celebrating the power of even being at the table for a report like that, being considered in a report like that, being given the opportunity to know what a report like that sounds like. And I spent just as many days in gratitude.

Mark Cole:
So you know what that means? 20 days before I could make a decision. So next time I’ll go, man, I can’t complain for 10 days because it’s going to take me 10 days to get out of this mess. I think the discipline of saying for every complaint, a statement of gratitude’s got to come out. For every hour kicking the can down the street and dragging the lip, I’m going to have to find a way to lift the hands. I think that Discipline of replacing it hour for hour, item by item, is a great discipline to make sure, one, we don’t allow grumbling to be longer than gratitude. And number two, we found an argument for that complaining in a positive, grateful mindset.

Traci Morrow:
I love that so much. I wrote that down even because I, too, have somebody safe to grumble that out. That’s my husband, Casey. But it’s not carrying it forward because we’re going to keep. We can’t leave it behind us if we keep it inside, we’re carrying it forward everywhere we go. And John’s saying it’s going to keep sneaking out, seeping out of us, because we’re carrying it everywhere we go. But when we get it out of us, then it’s. It’s really something that can come out of our mouths and leave it behind us, and then we can walk forward in gratitude.

Traci Morrow:
And so I love that you made that so clear. And, and I love that you gave such a recipe, really an example, a guide for other people for how to do that. And that helps me as well. I love that you just title it and make it, put it into parameters. That’s so awesome. Thank you. Last one, and then we’ll just close out. Because he talks about how to grow to the next level, and I want to make sure we leave people with that.

Traci Morrow:
But he talks about who I was versus who I will become. And I think that’s something really. I thought I heard that with new ears. I’m sure I’ve heard him say it before, but I think just because of circumstances in my own life, I heard it in a new way. There is a. There is a season for, for, you know, talking about who you were in an old position, in an old city, in an old relationship, in an old whatever you. Is behind you that you are saying goodbye to and leaving behind in our audience, whatever it is that you are saying goodbye and leaving behind, it’s okay to address who you were in that space and not try to keep trying to put back on that old outfit, that old you. But growing in and looking forward to who will I become in this next season? I think Bob Goff talks about it in each decade like, like girl or boy, guy two is the.

Traci Morrow:
In the decade before your 20s. And then girl or guy three in the decade before your 30s, all the way up to girl, 60, guy, sexy 60. And so really looking at, like, who do I want to become in this next season of my life being very intentional of the kind of leader that you want to become in this next season. And so I’m just curious if there are any exercises that you do mark that as a leader as you are leaving behind challenging times. You know, you’ve been open to share on the podcast that you’ve just coming out and coming out of a challenging time in your leadership as you’re looking forward to. Who do you become in this next season as a leader? Are you very specific of the new the new you of who you want to be in this next two years, five years? How far out do you define it and how specific do you get as you create the you you want to become as this next, you know, best version of yourself?

Mark Cole:
Well, the quick answer to your question of how specific and how far out do I timeline it as far as I possibly can and with as much specificity as I possibly can. I want specifics and I want to have a clear pathway and a clear expectation of what I want as desired outcomes, when I want those desired outcomes, and what I will do when I have greater results or when I have less results. And so I try to even problem solve out what it’s going to look like if I overachieve or underachieve. So I do my best and I do that with a process called a year end review that I talk a lot about on this podcast with life planning, life mapping. I spend a lot of time with that trying to get as clear because the clearer the picture, the clearer the steps. The clearer the steps, the clearer the results from those steps to where you can adjust along the way. I think when you were talking about that. But I went to a recent process.

Mark Cole:
For me, this has happened that I can think of three other times in my life. One was at 17, one was at 30. I say three other times and then this one, the third one was when I was 42 and then recent and it’s this time to where yesterday’s identity was holding me back from embracing tomorrow’s identity. It’s almost like for those of you that have a faith reference from the Bible, it’s almost like a wrestling with Jacob where he started wrestling with the Lord in the evening as Jacob and he lost the wrestling match the next morning as Israel. His name was changed overnight. In the wrestling he lost his identity and he gained a new identity. And for him it was overnight. It’s never that quick for me.

Mark Cole:
I’m a slow learner. I’m not quite like Jacob. And so I’m absolutely in this place right now of realizing that yesterday’s identity that I’ve been trying to live in to do today’s responsibility is holding me back from my tomorrow’s destiny. And that whole understanding that yesterday’s identity and trying to take on today’s responsibility with yesterday’s identity is the very lid, the very barrier to my destiny. It’s that level of an identity crisis. And so I’m going through that. I’ve only done this three other times and every time was different. And the reason each time, the precipitated reasoning behind each of the identity changes has all been different.

Mark Cole:
But what is the same is a releasing, as John said of yesterday, putting behind you who you were and reaching for who you will become. And I have found the more successful you are, the less critical. Or in other words, if the change is optional rather than mandatory, you just had to do it one time I just had to do it. Circumstances just dictated it. The more optional it is and the less on the line there is, the easier it is, the more that’s on the line and the more optional it is. I don’t really have to go through an identity change. Yesterday’s identity of Mark Cole was pretty good, but it is a showstopper from what I could be. And that releasing of the identity when I have an option not to do it and when I have more at stake if I do, it makes it so much harder.

Mark Cole:
And I don’t think you have identity changes often. I mean we’re not teaching dual personalities here on the Maxwell Leadership podcast, but we’re teaching that yesterday, as John said, who you were will hold you back from who you will become if you’re not careful. I love this. I mentioned also and also’s comment today is kind of how I want to close because also how you processed in your comments how you have delivered results on a podcast that we had. It’s actually what you focus on expands part two. We’ll put that podcast as well as part one in the show notes. But also says I want to start now and create a brand new end. Kind of goes to this identity thing also that I was just talking about.

Mark Cole:
He said. So I want to start now and create a brand new end. So I will have to 1 spend time with the right people. 2 say what I need to say 3 take action on things that are worthwhile. 4 don’t allow others to control my destiny. Also said I have a lot of work to do do so I better get started right away. Also that is why we do this podcast. Thank you for literally processing not only that you enjoyed the podcast, but giving us a step by step play of what you’re doing.

Mark Cole:
Also, you got to get back on here. Give us a comment on how well you’re doing now that you’ve put that plan in action. And to the rest of our podcast family, I hope today gave you some things that will inspire you, that will challenge you, that will re identify you to accomplish the future you that will make such a big difference in the world around you. Thanks for listening today. Go do something powerful positive because everyone deserves to be led well.

Maxwell Leadership Certified Team:
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Transcript created by Castmagic.