THE SUCCESS BLOG

How to gain a little more calm and a lot less chaos by understanding have vs. lack of control.

A client of mine recently said me to that his deepest, truest desire was to have financial freedom. When I probed him further about what he meant by "financial freedom", he explain that it meant to have "complete and total control over my life: I decide what I do, when I do, how I do."

It's this topic of control I want to explore.

(Caveat: I am not talking about control over someone in a controlling, dominating, evil sort of way. I'm talking about control over something in our lives, and control over our own life, specifically.)

When we have control, we feel calm. When we lack control, we feel chaos. If you are someone who thrives in calm, then keep reading. Even if you're someone who thrives in chaos, keep reading!

Some of the areas in our life that we may not have control over include: what time you show up to work, how much money you currently make, whether or not you're up for a promotion, when you go on vacation or take PTO, heck! having to ask someone for PTO! 

If you strive to have more, or complete, control over your life and your own destiny, it may seem like a daunting or impossible dream to achieve that total control. You may be arguing, "But in order for me to decided when & how, I would need to be my own boss, and be über successful, and right now, I just don't want to / can't start my own business." 

No worries. Old Blue Eyes will tell you to dream the impossible dream.

But in the meantime, here is my suggestion on how you can create more of a sense of control over your life, your destiny, your dream.

Get a piece of paper (or the back of napkin, whatever you've got) and write at the top CONTROL, then make 2 columns: Have Control | Lack Control. Make a quick list of areas in your life where you do have control and areas where you lack control. The items on the list can be mundane or profound -- up to you.

For example:

This will put into perspective what you already can and do control, and point you in the direction of what you may want to focus on in your Master Plan so that you can start moving some of the Lack Control items into the Have Control column. 

Go back to your Control list from above, circle one item under your Lack Control column, and dissect it. What would it take to get that item under the Have Control column? Write down (or think about) all the things you would have to do to move that item over.  Then choose one of those To Do items, and make a commitment to yourself that you will do it by X date. 

For example: Let's say we want to move the Lack Control item "When I take vacation." A few smaller steps we can control might be the general quarter or time of month we can take a vacation. If you work in sales, for instance, end of month or end of quarter is typically off limits. So maybe we look at just beginning of month or quarter. That gives us a few weeks a year in which we can take our vacation. Another thing we can control is where we go, how much we spend, and with whom we go. If we have one week of vacation, we can choose to sit on a beach at an all-inclusive resort with our spouse, or we can choose to go on a pub crawl with our friends in Dublin. Yes, our options might be limited, but let's look at the glass as half full and appreciate that we even have  options! Another word for option is choice, and another word for choice is control.

BAM! We just found a few different ways that we can control our vacation. Let's circle that Have Control item -- "where I go on vacation" -- and move it over to the Have Control column. Now, is there one thing you can do by the next quarter to get one step closer to going on that vacation to Dublin? Of course there is! (Hint: put aside some money, send a group text with the idea, Google an itinerary, etc.) 

By understanding the things over which we lack control, we can create a Master Plan to focus on how to change the lack to have, thus, transforming chaos to calm. And sure, a planned bar crawl in Dublin for a few days may not be as amazing as a month in the Maldives on your own private island answering to nobody and nothing but your internal clock. But hey, you gotta start somewhere! And a good place to start is a little more calm, and a lot less chaos.

In the meantime, keep dreaming that impossible dream, because one day you'll wake up and it won't seem so impossible anymore... 

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