Flash Forward with Business

Flash forwards are used in movies to interrupt the continuity of the story line through the narration or portrayal of some future episode.  If we liken our mental gymnastics to a movie or play, our daydreams are nothing other than flash forwards.  

Similar to the great new TV series on ABC, some of our imagined scripts are pleasant and some are less so.  Either way, the film director in our minds has set the stage and played out events that are expected, projected or imagined to occur in the future.  The polar opposite of a flash forward is a flashback, which are the stories that have occurred in our pasts that we use to guide our judgments.

Finding success takes much more than positive thinking and watching training videos.  All that we take in is supposed to be applied.  Measuring our success against another person’s can cause us to stall in our forward progress.  For example, if one of our colleagues has tried out a program and made good income in a minimal amount of time and our attempts do not produce a similar or greater amount as quickly using their same methods, we can easily talk ourselves out of proceeding with our plans.  That doesn’t mean it didn’t work.  It means that those methods used by your colleague do not work for you.

In the movie Hitch, perseverance is defined as continuing with a course of action without regard to discouragement, opposition, or previous disappointment.  Man!  Does that ever describe the mindset needed to effect change in your business or in your life but let’s stick to business.  Like kissing frogs to find a prince, programs that we try can manifest what we are looking for … or not.  Using the proverbial “cup is half full” viewpoint, we must be adaptable and take things in stride, fully aware that each one has taught us something that we can leverage down the road.  Eventually one will be “the answer” or spark a brand new idea that cannot be quashed by anyone or anything.

So what if your idea isn’t unique?  If the information or product isn’t readily available for free, you have found something you can monetize.  Pining over worries that your new idea will not be as popular as a similar one you have heard of or tried is a flash forward can keep you from innovating something even better.  Clairfy your thoughts, jot down your idea, conduct your market research and, if the results of your findings reveal a niche market that you can go after and hope to dominate, continue by defining your market strategy and business plan.  Once you know where you’re going and how you will get there, it is full steam ahead!

Frequently, our ideas are born from personal needs.  As the old adage goes, necessity is the mother of invention.  It is the truth that there were no wheels, once upon a time.  There are literally millions of examples just like that in your everyday life, once you stop to think about them.  Each of those inventors and entrepreneurs may have sounded like lunatics when their ideas were new but they didn’t let that stop them, thank goodness.

Brilliance is a Birthright

Brilliance is everyone’s birthright, isn’t it?  Whether or not we made the Dean’s List at school, we all come up with amazing ideas which seem mundane to us and others view as being strokes of genius.  You will know when you have latched onto one of these.  When your light bulb moment consumes your waking thoughts and is exciting enough to keep you from hitting the snooze button in the morning, promote it to a passion.  You know it is right, you know people need it, and you must do what is necessary to bring it to them.

Your Flash Forward doesn’t have to be a flash in the pan.  You know what you must do.  Quit thinking and talking about it and get to work!