A few weeks ago I wrote a piece about the challenges posed
by trying to become a superhero (see the road to becoming a superhero is pavedwith broken ice makers). To recap – I
wrote about the difficulty in transforming into a comic book character cut from
the Batman cloth (sans mystical/magical/supernatural/superscientific
intervention). In my case, I did not
want to be the Dark Knight nor Iron Man but Super-Bad-Ass-Dada… a.k.a.
Subad. Most of you will not be too surprised
to learn that it was mostly tongue in cheek.
However, the handful of readers out there who know me well probably
suspected something else lurking below the surface of the Subad story. You might have seen the shadow cast by a
Secret Plan.
The dangers inherent in revealing a secret plan are
legion. Among the most obvious issues is
that of commitment. Once you have
publicly committed to a course of action you have bound some of your
credibility to the outcome. You have to
walk the talk. Quitting and walking away
from the project takes on a whole different aspect. The declaration of “this I will do” is a bit
like a marriage vow. You stand before
your assembled friends, family, and even the gods of your ancestors and declare
“I am on the plane till we level out or crash into the mountain”. There is no bailing out. You throw out the parachute. It is very hard to do the first time. The second time, after a crash and burn, is
brutally hard. Most of us crash and burn
a few times before we learn to either play it safe/shut up - or to walk our
talk. Just because revealing the Secret
Plan is scary though is no reason not to do it.
Throwing out the parachute, when the flight is worth it, is a critical
step. Some flights leave without you if
don’t toss it before boarding.
It doesn’t matter if you are a Super-Bad-Ass-Dada or just a
Regular-Old-Bald-Ass-Dada. Subad and
Robad are faced with people that do want them to succeed. Both Subad and Robad have overt enemies try
to poison the wells, well-intended but limiting friends, and unequivocal
supporters. Unfortunately, stories told
by the first two groups are the easiest to hear. Both are telling themselves narratives that
are different than the narrative of the Secret Plan. One of the hard parts about reinventing
yourself is breaking out from the force of the story that other people are
telling themselves about you. Almost
everyone says “I don’t care what other people think about me”. We are all liars. We care.
The stories carry a weight that propels, drags upon, enrages, motivates,
depresses, and limits us. Make no
mistake – most of the time we play a serious role in the shaping of these
stories. The enemies’ stories and the friends’ are a combination of our actions
and how they have chosen to interpret them.
Sometimes the story is grossly unfair; and, other times it is something
we can never live up to. It is seldom
dead on accurate. It might be who you
were… but it doesn’t have to be who you are going to be. You can write a new story. There is a point at which you have to let
people in on the Secret Plan. If you
don’t they never get to change their story about you, and trust me – you will
need the energy that their new story creates.
Secret Plans cannot be implemented on your own, doesn’t matter if you
are Subad or Robad.
My own Secret Plan is uber-ambitious but is broken into
concrete stages that build upon one another.
It does not involve having an island hideaway with lots of henchmen and
a giant city-killing laser or anything like that. It is based on some pretty basic
premises.
1. I am happier when I am very
fit.
2. The longer I live, the more time
I have to be successful.
3. I am a
teacher and a coach.
4. I am a
competitor.
5. We need me to have an income.
All of those premises add together to equal my own Secret
Plan. In a nutshell, the plan is
to.... Well, more to follow. Maybe.
Walking away. Plan stays Secret
for now. Some things are better left....
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