Sometimes the freedom of the Twisting Road means you get to try a new route to see how it works. And sometimes the freedom of the Twisting Road means you get to take the route off your plan when it doesn’t work out for you. Continue reading
I set aside the three (or so) books I’ve been reading consecutively after I spent a little time at Barnes & Noble evaluating another book. I’ve heard about it for years, even picked it up a couple of times, but never read more than the flaps and maybe a chapter introduction. But once I committed to looking closely and started reading, I was mesmerized. Two days later I was deflated and, well – forlorn. Continue reading
I’m reading The 7 Habits Of Highly Effective Families
One Covey theme I knew already was “begin with the end in mind.” I embrace that approach when I ask one of my favorite questions, “To what end?” In this book he uses analogies of trips without maps and construction without blueprints. If you don’t know where you’re headed, you’re not going to get there. Fair enough. But lately I’ve been hearing people’s struggles as they try to figure out the work they’re born to do. They’re ready for change but don’t know where to head yet. How do they begin? Continue reading
Since the theme of my articles on creative work and self-employment is the “Twisting Road,” imagine how humbling it was for me to be driving on twisting roads for the first time in several years during my recent trip. It wasn’t very much fun, and it seemed like a huge nuisance. Continue reading
My first step at communicating about my new career was starting this blog as Chasing Wisdom. I did that before I was even clear what my new career would be. I narrowed my focus to personal development coaching and renamed this blog Twisting Road. I started a Blog-Zine at Chasing Wisdom where I wrote about creative career choices, self-employment, getting along with money, mentorship as leadership, and time management.
A few months back I started an e-mail newsletter, On The Twisting Road, to focus on creative careers, self-employment, and entrepreneurship. That led to some important questions, like What’s the difference between Chasing Wisdom and my e-mail newsletter? and Do I still need both of them? I finally sorted out my ideas and made some big decisions. But why in the world did I choose now to put them in place?
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Talking with other people is an important part of making a wise decision. We all need the additional information and the new perspective of good counsel. But not all counsel is good! We have to listen carefully to tell which part of the response is wisdom. Continue reading
The Suburban I own is eight years old. It has over 135,000 miles on it. In 2005, when it had about 110,000 miles on it, we drove it from Texas to Minnesota and back for a soccer tournament. After that, I got concerned about reliability and gas prices. Instead of upgrading to a new Suburban, we bought a Honda Accord and kept the old Suburban. Last December I took the Suburban in for a thorough “check-up” and decided it was sound enough for a road trip to Orlando and back. It did great. At the end of June we had a road trip to the beach and then back to San Antonio to drop my son at soccer camp. I took the Suburban, and it did great, especially driving on the sandy beach.
So why did I decide to drive the Accord when my younger son and I went back to San Antonio to pick up my older son? Continue reading
It’s the end of the month. It’s the end of the quarter. And it also happens to be halfway through the year. The calendar is practically screaming at me that it’s time to review my progress on this year’s goals and adjust them if I need to. Continue reading
Maybe it’s the heat, which showed up at least three weeks before summer officially arrived. Maybe it’s the culmination of conversations with other people training to be coaches and online forum chats with other people trying to make a creative career change. Maybe it’s writing down the story of my very expensive and foolish misadventures pursuing different “business opportunities” in the past. Something has sapped the urgency and pressure from my schedule for building my business.
It could be something as simple as the fact we’re adding some vacation days to the front end and back end of a trip to drive my older son to soccer camp. There’s nothing like the thought of vacation to send motivation running!
I know times like these come during any large project. There is an ebb and flow to focus and motivation. The accountability and focus of a coaching group (I’m in one) or accountability buddies (I have those in the creative career forum if I just ask) usually help people stay on track, even when it feels like slow plodding through mud. But we’re all being affected in a similar way and not accomplishing much.
I’ve decided just to give in. I’m planning to go with the flow. I’ll kick back and take it easy. Just as soon as it gets easy.
So far, summer has been busy. We had soccer camp and then a soccer tournament. We’re getting a new bed and mattress for the master bedroom so the old ones are going into the guest bedroom/home office. That means it’s in the middle of being rearranged and looks like a storage shed. This all started when I thought about how to rearrange the guest bedroom and talked with my wife about having a real bed for guests should we ever have any. That became the push we needed to go ahead and get the new larger bed for our bedroom and move our old bed into the guest bedroom. In coaching we call things like this “forwarding the action!”
The new bed comes tomorrow so I’ll be moving one and setting the other up. Wednesday the technician comes to fix the phone line on the wall where I relocated the desk in my home office. Thursday we leave for a couple of days of fun before dropping my older son at a university soccer camp for the week.
I thought I had been sweating a lot because of the heat. I’m realizing it’s a combination of rushing around and worrying about getting everything done!
I’ve decided to accept additional coaching clients. I believe I can handle up to three more if I add them slowly. I’ll start contacting my friends and colleagues to let them know later this week and the week I get back from the first trip. I look forward to having some more clients, but I won’t mind if I don’t get any more until August. That will be after the trip to soccer camp, and the trip back to pick up my son from soccer camp, and then our long road trip to North Carolina for – you guessed it – another soccer tournament.
The old laptop’s going with me on all the trips. I’ll be working on my book for people who are deciding if self-employment and entrepreneurship are right for them. With all these other things going on, I’m keeping my work schedule this summer narrowed down to coaching, writing the book, and writing my weekly articles. There’s nothing like the stress of a crowded schedule to bring clarity and purpose to work!
May You Know the Joy of Sharing Your Gifts,
Steve Coxsey
This past week my younger son had a soccer camp every morning and it was about a half hour drive from our home. I packed up my zippered binder, laptop, and three-ring notebook each day to be able to use some of the camp time for work.
What I didn’t discover was consistently good coffee nearby. I don’t enjoy coffee first thing in the morning and usually have a couple of cups mid-morning during my work. I can’t brew it in my car –yet – so I tried three different places during the week with mediocre results. What I did discover is which parts of my work routine I can pack up and take with me.
My daily planner is in my zippered binder with my monthly targets and weekly steps, so I was able to plan my day while eating breakfast and drinking mediocre coffee. Anything that was planning or list-making, like choosing groups of people to contact as part of my referral seeking program, could be done in the binder. Reading for professional development was obviously portable, also.
I took my laptop along and was able to write drafts of articles and spend time doing creative writing. When the places with coffee were too crowded and noisy for me to write, I learned it was easiest to sit in the back seat of my car, windows down, with a little bit of shade. This worked as long as I had a nice breeze because it’s getting darned hot in north Texas.
I started looking mid-week for places with Wi-Fi to see how it would work to access my web site and autoresponder control panels. I didn’t find anywhere with free Wi-Fi so I didn’t try it out. I left my e-mail time and web site and blog management for the afternoons when I was back in my office. With a little more information and experience I’ll be able to find internet access while I’m out, and with a little bit of effort I’ll be able to learn how to access my business e-mail through the web. Then I’ll be ready to turn any mediocre coffee joint with a shaded parking lot into my office.
This is a boost for me because I was talking about what I want and need in my home office with a coaching colleague this week. We are taking an advanced coaching skills class and were doing some practice to apply the skills when I looked around and realized my home office just happened by default nearly five years ago and I haven’t improved it since. As we talked and she practiced coaching skills, I realized I don’t need an office as much as I need comfortable space and user-friendly materials and equipment. I can write on the computer wherever I can set up my laptop. I can write in a three-ring notebook wherever I can find quiet space and not too much wind. I can brainstorm and arrange ideas wherever I can spread out a few sheets of paper. I can talk to coaching clients wherever I have a good phone connection and no distractions.
Realizing I don’t have to be in my office to work, and that I can plan to work in different areas of my home or at a park or a coffee joint even when my office is available to me, freed me up to design the office I need. I’ve made the cluttered guest-bedroom-turned-home-office into a chaotic mix of boxes, papers, equipment, and frequently moved pieces of furniture. It’s a total mess, especially since I have to wait almost two weeks until the technician can come and hook up the recently disconnected phone line opposite of where I have the phone and fax now. But when that’s set I’ll have a corner of the room for the computer, resources, and bookkeeping, plus a filing cabinet for paperwork. The rest of the room will become a comfortable guest room for when we need that, and I’ll use it as an office for only a few tasks. For me, having much of my work be portable is liberating.
May You Know the Joy of Sharing Your Gifts,
Steve Coxsey