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Begin Again is for people in the second half of life who sense that the identity they've been carrying no longer fits. Host Winston Faircloth — spiritual director, daily poet, and fellow traveler — brings honest conversation, personal story, and original poetry to the journey of remembering, releasing, and returning to who God created you to be. Visit www.myreuniontour.com for more resources.
Hey there. It's Winston Faircloth, and welcome back to episode 52 of the Begin Again Leadership Podcast. We're back after a short break, and we're preparing for up our upcoming season number two coming soon by taking you behind the curtain on changes over here at winstonfaircloth.com. Now in this series we've been sharing our plan on how we're going to be serving three types of business owners leaders who either want, need, or have teams to help them multiply their impact by creating, growing, or keeping teams that they love. And we call this process for love of team.
Winston Faircloth:And in our last episode, I shared how taking a pause otherwise known as refinement helped give me the margin that I needed to reset. And during that podcast, we covered my four step refinement framework of unplug, unlearn, rest, and relearn. So just to recap, unplug was a season of disconnecting from external resources just temporarily whether they were podcasts or coaches or masterminds etc. Then there was this process of unlearning which was reevaluating and challenging existing ideas beliefs or concepts. Then rest experimenting with and understanding ways to deepen my own rest and then relearn which was incorporating new practices and beliefs to set you on a new path.
Winston Faircloth:That's all in our last episode. And today let's talk about the most powerful part of pivoting your business and life and I call it WHYpower. When you've taken some time time for margin and by the way it doesn't have to be weeks or months sometimes a long weekend away will do. You'll be flooded with creative or problem solving ideas And if you're particularly decisive or quick start by nature, now that you've decided the what, it's easy to jump immediately into figuring out the how. And no doubt if you're a student of leadership you've heard about SMART goals.
Winston Faircloth:Specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time bound. Makes sense right? Set those goals, solve this problem, get on with business. Well, there's a challenge with this approach. Sometimes when we run into resistance or issues, we can either grind through it or jump to the next creative solution.
Winston Faircloth:And since this is the Begin Again podcast, you can guess my tendency, right? I love fresh starts and while I can grind with the best of them when it's necessary, it's not my natural strength. Grinding in business and life reminds me of the term willpower. I will keep churning and working from a position of brute strength, of will. I will not quit.
Winston Faircloth:I will find a way. That's who I am. Perseverance is my middle name. Where there's a will, there's a way. Our culture has dozens and dozens of similar sayings.
Winston Faircloth:You know, we can point to stories of being three feet from gold, to never give up, never say die. That spirit makes America and our culture great at times. And some people like me can be just that stubborn. Perhaps the last two years and tens and tens of thousands of dollars would be enough evidence of grinding and struggle in my own online business journey. But willpower is not the answer.
Winston Faircloth:Instead, why power is the recognition that ideas without purpose are not enough. Why power. Smart people like you and me miss this critical step in our urgency or commitment to take massive action. And in so doing, we can be so focused on near term strategies and tactics. Your why can be both a destination and a path of self discovery.
Winston Faircloth:Some people gravitate to their ideal destination first. And there's so many great writing and visualization exercise to help with this. Here are some of my favorites that I've done in the past. The perfect ideal day, writing down everything you can think about, what the comprise ideal day from the moment that you wake up to the moment that you lay your head on the pillow at night. How about writing your own eulogy?
Winston Faircloth:Boy, that will really help you imagine the final destination. What will people say about you at the end of your life? We've all seen vision boards, where you have images of your future life that that give you a powerful visual cue as to what you are hoping and expecting in your life. How about a reward or series of rewards for milestone achievements as you reach certain goals? All of these destination type situations can be extremely powerful.
Winston Faircloth:But in my experience, blend your wide destination with deep and powerful self discoveries even more powerful. And what do I mean by that? Recently, my mentor challenged me to think about now hang on for a moment a twenty five year vision. Now given my state of mind coming into retirement season, I kind of rolled my eyes here because in my pre retirement state, I had a hard time imagining what the next month or week or quarter would look like. And now he's asking me to think about a 100 quarters from now.
Winston Faircloth:Here's the challenge as he presented it. What if you invested yourself for twenty five years on a singular focus? A singular focus over twenty five years. Something that constantly fascinates and inspires you. A purpose that comes easily and naturally to you.
Winston Faircloth:A why that pulls you in and draws you higher. Woah. That seems daunting twenty five years from now, but it was also extremely freeing. Twenty forty five. It's almost impossible to map out the what or how.
Winston Faircloth:Right? Especially after this year of 2020 when so many of our goals or plans were upended by external circumstances. And with time margin and the daily practice I'm about to describe, you too can find this why. Let's break down his question once again. Without the restrictions of what or how, and that is the hardest part of this by the way, leaders like us, we jump.
Winston Faircloth:We're problem solvers. We we'd love to get in there and mix it up. We want to figure it out. But without figuring out the what or the how, what's something that fascinates and inspires you? Think about that for a moment.
Winston Faircloth:Drawing from your earliest memories or experiences, what feels right in terms of devoting your next hundred quarters to exploring? How about something that comes easily or naturally to you? Your mind is already probably coming up with why that's not a good idea because no one's gonna pay you for something that comes easy and naturally to you. Well, let's stay focused and true here for a moment. Think about and feel these four words with joy and ease.
Winston Faircloth:Something that fascinates, inspires you, comes easily and naturally to you with joy and ease. This is still a really hard exercise. And here's the kicker. The answer to this question is not likely to immediately appear. So here's a process.
Winston Faircloth:I hope that you will take this to heart and give it a try. Why don't you take a few moments each day when you're freshest and most energetic, and that varies for all of us, commit to write down daily your wants and your desires around this twenty five year question. You cannot know the what or the how. Order up what fascinates and inspires you, comes easily and naturally to you, and you would do with joy and ease. Commit to doing this every day with whatever inspired thought comes to mind.
Winston Faircloth:Eventually, you'll begin to spot some patterns, a theme if you will. And for me, my twenty five year purpose came pretty quickly as especially as I released the need for the what or the how. That's I think the most important part of this twenty five year vision is it's almost impossible to figure out the what or the how. So as I surveyed my own career and my own education, I noticed I really enjoyed team building. How that right blend of perspectives and backgrounds always brought about a surprisingly better outcome than I had originally imagined.
Winston Faircloth:I also loved leadership. How people have always been naturally drawn to me as a leader even when I didn't see it in myself. And then I went deeper. I went through five why questions about these desires. It wasn't enough, for example, just to lead a team of interesting people.
Winston Faircloth:I kept digging deeper and with the freedom of thinking twenty five years from now, my aspirations kept going higher. One morning on my walk, four words came to mind that immediately captured and captivated me. And I think this is the theme that you're looking for as well. Something that just resonates deep within that captures and captivates. And for me, it was four words, for love of team.
Winston Faircloth:Now admittedly, this is a wordplay off the term that we hear a lot for love of the game in professional and collegiate sports and amateur sports. Players who do it for the love of the game. But it also deeply resonate with me, not only working within a team I love, but to help and inspire others to build, grow, and keep teams that they love. And it's so missing in so many businesses today. So many leadership and and business approaches have nothing to do with loving their team.
Winston Faircloth:And so for me, this became not just a mission. It's becoming a movement. So many businesses, especially online startups, see having a team as a cost, a line item on the budget, and they don't take action because it's chicken or the egg. How can I pay for a team? That's the wrong question.
Winston Faircloth:What if your team was not a cost but a multiplier? The difference between a limited small service and a life changing business with impact far beyond your imagination today. As I've really settled into those four words for love a team, This became a mission I could absolutely devote my next 100 quarters to. And with that lens, it also takes away a ton of pressure. I have more than enough time to reach this place.
Winston Faircloth:It gives me tremendous purpose to each of the next 100 quarters where I can focus on 1% improvement each ninety days. And what this does is it filters out those opportunities that inevitably come across every one of our desks that can take you away from your mission. But most importantly, this twenty five year perspective helps me with what I needed most coming out of retirement. It helps me to start over better. Think about those three words, start over better.
Winston Faircloth:I can see now how everything in my life to this point because I'm focusing on what fascinates and inspires me, what comes easily and naturally, what comes with joy and ease. I can see how everything up to this point in my life is preparing me for this bigger and brighter future. So destination and self discovery leads to that why that drives everything else from there. So all of this starts with releasing our natural tendency of seeking what's and how's and instead diving deep, deep into your why power. Well, I'll have so much more to say about this process as it unfolds for us as for love of team comes to life in the marketplace of ideas and concepts.
Winston Faircloth:So my question to you, do you have a twenty five year why in mind today? And if not, will you commit to writing down your desires and wants daily for the next ninety days? It will help you. You won't have to grind when you have a compelling why. It will help you filter out the noise.
Winston Faircloth:It will help you move towards a future that you were destined to be part of. So as a reminder, this four point series, we're sharing our journey from burnout to breakthrough with four p's. Last time we talked about pause. Today we talked about purpose. Next time we're going to talk about provision.
Winston Faircloth:And then lastly, we're going to talk about our plan. And what's unfolding for us is that we know for sure that teams you love unlock and multiply your impact, that we as a company value long term relationships as your strategic partner, and we're preparing ourselves to meet business owners along the journey through a series of seminars, intensive membership, and our unique approach to unlocking team innovation. And we're just getting started. You're not going to see this on our website because we're working with our initial cohort of business clients around this want need and have team spectrum. And over the coming weeks, you're going to see this shift in our podcast and in our online presence.
Winston Faircloth:So step one, pause. Step two, today, purpose. Next time we're going to talk about provision. How when you become aligned with your why, opportunities you never considered start coming your way. So catch our next episode at seven a.
Winston Faircloth:M. Eastern Time next Monday morning. That's when we're dropping our weekly podcast going on a on a go forward basis. And I'd ask you to subscribe in Apple Podcast or any of your favorite podcast players so you don't miss a single episode of this unfolding here. I'm so thankful for your time today.
Winston Faircloth:I hope this inspires you to consider WHYpower as your key ally in building the business and life of your dreams. And as we've shared on every episode, remember the biggest breakthroughs in business and life occur the moment you decide to begin again. I'll catch you on the next episode.