Episode 195: Challenge #12 – Forward Someone Else’s Agenda

Episode 195: Challenge #12

Challenge #12 -  Give someone in your SOI hardy encouragement for something they are doing. Do what you can to forward their agenda.  We create. Everyday we create connection, chaos, possibility, drama, conversation, expectations, money, homes, relationships, works of art, friction, love, stories, or we don’t… Our power lies in our ability to direct our life story with every choice  and every thought. Welcome to the Love Your Story podcast and the 21 Life Connection Challenges - 21 life hacks that have been set up to help you connect, take care of  your fabulous self, create possibility in your one and only life, and get out of the dol drums and anxiety that’s looming.  This series of podcasts highlights the challenges one-by-one, gives you background on why the challenge was included in the 21 chosen challenges, a deeper understanding of the concept itself, and ideas on how to implement it. These simple challenges create big ah-ha’s and leave you with some great new tools to play with. Today we focus on Challenge #12 - which is: Give someone in your sphere of influence hardy encouragement for something they are doing. Do what you can to forward their agenda.  Tune in for how giving really is the key to receiving.  A few years back a read a book called Love is the Killer App. It espoused the novel idea that the very most successful way to do business was to actually help other people. When you interview a client, spoke with an associate, met someone new, the first thing you do is consider what you know, who you know, what books you’ve read, …you search your arsenal of value and see what you can give to the other person to support them where they are at. GIVE. Do you know someone you could introduce them to that would further their agenda? Have you read a book that would support what they are currently working on? Have you found a digital tool that would support their forward movement? In a world where people are always pushing their own agenda, this was novel, fresh, pioneering. Tune in to hear the excerpt from that book.... Let me share some personal experiences.

1. I have been in many networking groups, training groups, and entrepreneurial support style groups. When I need something as simple as a review for the podcast, let’s say, and I put that out to the group, I’m always surprised at how difficult it is for people to even give a few easy minutes to support someone else’s agenda. They all show up hoping someone will give them the next best client, but they aren’t willing to support one another. It’s been interesting for me to watch. Even people who commit to leaving a podcast review, in this example, often won't follow through, in my experience. It makes it easy to make a splash in a room like this when you go in willing to support them.
2. The end of 2019 I invited a group of influencers together to share what they were about with the express intent that each person who attended would see what they could do to move the others’ agendas forward. It wasn’t about pushing your own agenda, it was about seeing what you could do to help others, but at the same time, the very nature of this sharing made it so your own agenda would be focused on by others also. It’s amazing how much getting connected to the right person or business can help. How an idea you hadn’t thought of can change things for you because someone else did a little brainstorming with you. We really don’t do this alone. But when you come at it from how can I help instead of how can you help me, you actually get both with a lot more success.
3. During Christmas I throw a retreat for my sister and sister in-laws. This past year we were doing a round table and sharing what we were about for 2021. I was talking about the new 21 Challenges Group platform that was launching and my dear sister in-law says, if you need help selling your book, I can do that. Those beautiful words are just the sort of thing you don’t hear very often. This is the type of thing I’m talking about.

This is why this challenge is so powerful. Because by these small acts of sharing who we are, what we know, things we’ve learned, we can help someone else out immeasurably. It’s an act of kindness, but even more so, it’s an act of networking w great Karma. Just as was illustrated in the influencers example I just shared, when you give to others they give to you. You build relationships on caring and sharing instead of competition and self-promotion. The people in your life, in your sphere of influence, who have agendas they are pouring their heart and soul into, will be so grateful for someone else to care about what they are doing. It’s such an easy way to shine, to connect, to network, to share, to build valuable relationships in the very best way. Martha Beck, International Life Coach, said, “Relationships are the most important human experience available to us. I realized in my twenties that the meaning of life is not about what happens to people; it’s about what happens between people. Learning to connect with each other, to experience empathy, to step outside our own experience, and to experience love in all its forms—these, I believe, are the experiences for which we became human.” While this challenge is definitely about stepping above the crowd, creating relationship on a higher level of doing, it’s a very Karmic way to approach your personal networking (friends, family, work).  When people realize that you work as a love cat, that you’re passionate, kind, a doer, a helper, you know people and things,  they become increasingly aware of who you are and they soon start caring about what you do, how they can help you by nurturing the relationship, and the good comes rolling back around.  Be a Love Cat! Today find someone in your sphere of influence and do something to support them, just for the sake of testing this out. You might even like it so much, you’ll start working this way, and how much better would the world be then?   See you in two weeks for our next episode of the Love Your Story podcast and how you can create your best life on purpose.