I promised to write about the coincidence that when you open yourself to positive possibilities they "magically" appear, and it seems appropriate to make this the first post of the New Year. My title comes from an often quoted passage about this by William H Murray, who goes on to explain rather poetically that: "The moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves too" and who also quotes Goethe that: "Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it".
And by coincidence (!) at Xmas I received a lovely update from a client I worked with a while ago which illustrates perfectly this effect. I'll try to tell their story without giving away too much that is personal. When we worked together, the explicit goal was around achieving a senior level promotion. However, what became clear very quickly was that they were frustrated in many aspects of their life (reaching the point of depression). They dd not enjoy work and did not actually want the promotion. But it was "the devil they knew" and there were "no other options out there". They could only see the negative possibilities in uncertainty, not really believing that there could be positive possibilities in taking risk (ironically also the reason they were unlikely to get their promotion). So they sat waiting for the right opportunity to change their life to appear - and of course it never did appear, because they literally could not see it.
Then, after some fairly serious personal development (not with me - we agreed it wasn't right for our coaching contract) they made a move to another company. It wasn't the perfect job, and it wasn't that different a company. So, rationally, it wasn't opening up anything. Their old mindset would have dismissed it as pointless - in fact they had rejected this offer several times in previous years. But their new mindset was: "Who knows? At least I'm doing something positive and there's a chance something will come out of it". And then, the kicker. A few months into the new job, an opportunity did come their way through one of their new colleagues. This was a different type of job, in a different sector of the industry. They tell me it is perfect for them and it is going great. Yet when I first met them it would have been an option dismissed as an unrealistic dream, and they wouldn't have registered it even if they'd heard about it!
So that's how it works - attitudes and beliefs held deep in your limbic brain constrain your thinking and put filters on your perception which change and shape actual future possibilities. It's easy to accept as common sense that: "If you don't believe it can happen, it won't". What's harder to accept is that: "If you act on the belief that it can happen, it just might". But it is the same process.
