Internal focus on your objective will harness your vision

This week I feel really pumped about the entrepreneurial environment.

Wonderful things are happening, progressive discussions are taking place everywhere and more and more people are embracing the entrepreneurial option in their lives.

These are the days that I can easily reflect on words a friend recently asked me, “Joel, with all the work you do in the field, what do you love most about entrepreneurs?”

I couldn’t contain my reply: “I think what I enjoy the most is the spirit of entrepreneurship that they present to the world around them.”

I choose to define this spirit as one of risk-taking, innovation and creativity, pushing to the limits of what is known and understood.

Entrepreneurs dream up visions. And when they make these visions real, they create value—financial, social and cultural.

Entrepreneurs view change as a force of possibility rather than as a creator of problems.

Another perspective of igniting the entrepreneurial spirit might be that—entrepreneurship is the process of identifying, developing and bringing a vision to life.

The vision may be an innovative idea, an opportunity or simply, a better way of doing something socially and economically worthwhile.

The end result, of course, being the creation of a new venture, formed under the conditions of risk and some aspect of uncertainty.

Throughout my entrepreneurial coaching period, I’ve noticed a particular mindset that I often talk about publicly that helps to form the foundation from which this entrepreneurial spirit emerges.

One way of describing this mindset is internal focus, which means that what goes on inside of your head and your heart greatly affects what happens for you in the outside world.

I am reminded by many of my learned friends and entrepreneurs right here at home in the Okanagan Valley who state that it’s often not the external trappings—seminars, education, etc.—that make or break an entrepreneur.

It’s the internal focus of believing in yourself, listening to your intuition, and tuning into your emotions that allows the entrepreneurial spirit of dreaming big to spring forth.

By managing fear so that it doesn’t become an obstacle, you are then able to harness the perceived entrepreneurial opportunity that you so passionately have dreamed about.

Self-trust is paramount to risk-taking in the journey.

So, let’s ponder a couple of questions together: Where do you focus your thoughts? Are your choices based on fear? Or on possibility?

A former client of mine in Saskatoon brought it home to me, saying she understood the difference between making fear-based choices and choices based on self-trust.

An aspiring entrepreneur at the time of this discussion with me, she felt caught between remaining at her day job as a chemist and leaping into full-time entrepreneurship.

Through deep reflection and listening to her intuition, she became clear that the only thing keeping her chained to her lab was fear itself. (Ouch, where have we heard that nasty word before?)

She also recognized that by taking the risk to leave her day job, she actually had a greater chance of achieving her entrepreneurial dream and celebrating her entrepreneurial spirit.

Her dream venture required the full weight of her attention and resources and over time, she realized that the decisions she made based on her intuition and self-trust were the ones that led to her successful and rewarding path.

Therefore, my friends, a healthy entrepreneurial spirit requires trust in yourself, your intuition and an ability to make clear choices, a flare for mobilizing resources, and a capacity to move beyond obstacles created by fear.

Michael Gerber, author renowned for his E-Myth books and development system, states that “an entrepreneurial venture without a dream is a life without a purpose.”

Gerber’s premise here is being that unfortunately, dreamers work in their business rather than on their business.

Further, I was pleased to note when preparing for my column this week that Gerber has prescribed to a new mantra which he claims is to “awaken the entrepreneur within, by discovering their true dream, vision and mission.”

He calls it intentional dreaming, nothing to with problem solving and everything to do with transforming your life and venture in a radically creative manner and strategic way.

Gerber says that finding the entrepreneur within is likened to peeling an onion. Don’t take the first idea that surfaces, you need to decipher what the idea meant, then take it apart to see if that first idea is helping you avoid something bigger and better.

You need to keep asking yourself: What else is there? What is lurking behind?

Aristotle observed that every living organism has an inner force, a vitality that propels that organism to be fulfilled. He called that state of being entelechy.

Everyone has an entelechy, a vital force that is yearning to be expressed.

Our entelechy is uniquely our own and is encoded in our very being. Essentially, our entelechy is who we were born to be. (I kind of like Aristotle’s theory.)

One way to know our entelechy is for us to take a look at those everyday dreams we all have but somehow never get around to, or that just seem too unattainable to begin.

It may appear counterintuitive, but it has been found that as people express their entelechy, even though it may not seem directly related to the goal they have been trying to achieve, they start to see extraordinary results in their lives.

And, this is where I would like to present to you a relationship to the entrepreneurial spirit and dream machine.

Dear readers, perhaps, this is the time to make “someday, happen today.” I’ll be watching.

Joel Young is an entrepreneurship coach, educator and consultant and the founder of the Okanagan Valley Entrepreneurship Society.

eagleyoung@shaw.ca