Your Unique Voice... Hallelujah!

Michael and I had had 6 sessions together and he was still stuck. Michael was the typical Renaissance Professional - talented at a multitude of different skills, deeply curious about a variety of different fields, a quick learner, and exploding with ideas of new ventures to pursue. Loads of great ideas, quick learner, multi-talented... surely it’s the perfect formula for success? So why was Michael still stuck?

Michael was suffering from a bad case of RESISTANCE. Resistance is the silent killer, stealing more dreams and leading to more un-lived lives every year than heart disease and cancer put together, and made so much more powerful by the fact that so few people know how to recognize it. Resistance comes in many strains, but here are a few of the common symptoms that’ll let you know may have it:

• low energy, fatigue and increased desire to sleep during the day
• restlessness, boredom and fidgeting
• an increased fascination with detail and a strong desire to clean, organize, and alphabetize everything in your workspace
• a major drop in productivity
• poor concentration, easily distracted
• a sudden breadth and depth of imagination for catastrophe
• a mild to major paranoia about what other people think and a sense that the world may be conspiring against you
• increased sensitivity to the personality and behavioural flaws of those closest to you
• a flush of creativity and skill in the art of criticism and “soap box” oration on topics of a purely philosophical and irrelevant or non-practical nature
• increased desire for activities that provide immediate self-gratification: alcohol, shopping, TV, masturbation, and food containing fat, sugar, salt or chocolate
• increased participation in gossip and a penchant for drawing attention to yourself, getting yourself into trouble and creating life drama

In severe cases:

• the development of full-blown ADD
• clinical depression
• panic attacks
• the breakdown of significant relationships
• the development or recurrence of addictions to illegal, mood-inducing substances
• engagement in verbal aggression, violence, crime or self-destruction

But don’t worry if you got top scores on this test - just like heart disease and cancer, resistance is a disease of lifestyle, and entirely preventable and, in many cases it’s curable too. The key is to know what lifestyle habits put you at risk and to make better lifestyle choices. Here are some of the high risk lifestyle habits that Resistance Expert, Steven Pressfield, says could cause you to join the millions who suffer the agony of resistance:

• the pursuit of creative activities such as writing and art-making
• the launching of entrepreneurial ventures
• dieting and following health regimes
• participating in any program of spiritual advancement or personal development
• any activity whose aim is tighter abdominals
• any course designed to overcome an unwholesome habit or addiction
• education of every kind
• any act of political, moral, or ethical courage
• the undertaking of any endeavor to help others
• any act that entails a commitment of the heart (like a decision to get married, have a child, weather a rocky patch in a relationship)
• the taking of any principled stand in the face of adversity

Oh, dear... if you’re anything like me, Michael or the people I typically work with, you’re probably off-the-scale high risk. And the worst part is, you’re about as likely to change your lifestyle choices as Homer Simpson is to quit beer and do-nuts. Because you’re wired for doing the very things that elicit resistance. Even if you wanted to fall back on the mold, and live a conventional life, you wouldn’t know how. You’re just not good at that. You feel compelled to question and to push the boundaries, to take up challenges and to create. It’s like you don’t have a choice. So if we can’t prevent it, we’ll beat it some other way. So let’s take heart in Pressfield’s encouragement: “Overcoming resistance is like giving birth. It seems absolutely impossible until you remember that women have been pulling it off successfully, with support and without, for fifty million years.”

So here’s what Michael and I did, after diagnosing a chronic case of resistance. Resistance is a dis-ease that’s triggered by the body. The body reacts to any major change by creating resistance, because, from a survival point of view, major change (in body temperature or blood pressure, for example) could be fatal to the body. But the actual embryos of resistance manifest in the mind - and we can find them and pluck them out one at a time, to ease our path forward.

At the core of Michael’s resistance was the thought that he needed to come up with something truly unique and original, for it to be a worthy pursuit that the world would welcome and people would be willing to throw their money at. The problem was that, for every idea he came up with, he found that there was already somebody else doing “his idea” or something similar to it. And then he’d tell himself that his idea is already being done, the market is probably already taken, and the world doesn’t need another one of those. Of course, you’ve probably already started to notice a couple of holes in that argument - the gaps in the rationalization behind our resistance are always easier for other people to spot!

By identifying the core rationalization behind his resistance, Michael was able to turn his finely tuned skills of criticism on his own thoughts, and soon enough was able to see them for the lies they were, opening his eyes to the paradigm shift that made all the difference. Michael realized that the fact that somebody else was doing “his idea” was a useful indication that there IS a market for that service, and he came to appreciate that there are, in fact, very few truly original ideas behind the successful ventures being launched all over the world each day. Instead, successful people recognize that creativity is often more about bringing already existing ideas together in a new way, with a new voice - and there’s alot of room for that.

This Christmas season reminded me of Michael and the particular brand of resistance that he had struggled with. I'm sure you've all become familiar with the two versions of the "Hallelujah" song that made the top 2 chart spots, and being played everywhere this Christmas. The same song, sung by two different people, made it to number one and number two on the charts. And it wasn't their original idea - Leonard Cohen wrote it 20yrs ago. For me this is clear evidence that you don’t have to have an entirely new idea to be successful with your venture, and that there’s enough room for us all to be appreciated for our unique “voice.” So how will you be expressing your unique voice and what high risk lifestyle plans have you got lined up for this year?

‘Cos you know what’s great about resistance? Resistance is the clearest indication that you’re growing. So when you feel the symptoms of resistance coming on, just pause and smile to yourself, knowing that it’s a sign that you’re already making progress.