MentorWords

Line of Sight

A young man in Chicago (the son of a friend) was ticketed yesterday for rear-ending the vehicle ahead of him. The road was quiet, it was light out, and the weather was perfect. When his relieved+angry dad asked him “why weren’t you paying attention?” the boy replied, “I was!”

“You couldn’t have been paying attention if you ran into the car in front of you!”

“I was paying attention to the car behind me,” the shaken boy replied. “The driver was all over the road and kept getting too close, and I was afraid he was going to run into me.”

Last weekend my niece totaled a parked car and did significant damage to her new jeep (she is fine). She was heading to our house, and had a stack of DVDs on her dashboard. When the DVDs slid toward the passenger window she reached out to grab them and lost control of the car in a split second.

Seven years ago, two days after we bought our daughter a brand new RAV4, she completely bashed up two of the hubcaps, leading to replacement of all four in order to have a matched set of tires. The reason? A dog ran across the street in front of her, narrowly avoiding a deadly collision. As the dog ran up the curb and down the sidewalk, her eyes remained glued to him, and the car followed her line of sight.

The car always follows your line of sight. We know this. We were all taught this in driver education, and some of us have reinforced the lesson the hard way.

In fact, everything follows line of sight – whether that line of sight is visual or mental. People who fully expect – and can picture – healthy relationships tend to seek healthy partners. People who fully expect – and can picture – going to college and graduating, tend to complete their education. Children who fully expect to do well in school tend to do just that.

“Wait, wait, wait, wait a minute,” you’re thinking. “That’s not right. I had a bad relationship, and it’s not because I went looking for one. I had a failed business, and it’s not because I was trying to fail. I’m having a terrible time with my current manager, and it’s not because I wanted to hate my job.” How can I possibly assert that everything follows line of sight?

Consider this. Sometimes, what we want and what we focus on are two different things. If what we want is a good relationship, but all we can focus on is that we can’t trust anybody, the dominant focus is lack of trust. What happens when all we think about is how people are so untrustworthy? We tend to find ourselves in relationships with people who reinforce that belief.

I went through a time in my life when all I wanted to do was work for myself, write, and spend more time with my family, but what I focused on was that there was never enough time, never enough time, never enough time. Sure enough, there was never enough time! Only when I turned my focus – my line of sight – to the idea that I was making enough time, making enough time, making enough time, did I make enough time. Wanting it didn’t make it so. Focusing on it did.

Business owners who have taken the time to envision a successful future, including the types of customers they will serve and the products and services they will offer, tend to achieve their goals. Moms who have taken the time to envision what it will mean for their children to be successful adults – and not the needy children they are now – tend to do a better job of preparing their children for ultimate independence. Individuals who have taken the time to imagine themselves as successful, including all the qualities necessary to achieve their goals, tend to be more satisfied and confident.

But it’s not enough to simply imagine the future – then resume focusing on all the less-than-desirable aspects of now. Once imagined, you must turn your focus to the aspects of success you have imagined. You must properly train your line of sight to where you want to go – not where you’ve been or where you are right now. You’ve already achieved ‘now’. ‘Now’ doesn’t require any more of your focus, and telling historical stories is good for the campfire, but not for your day-to-day business of living.

You’ve heard the saying if you don’t know where you’re going, any road will take you there. That’s just a pithy way of saying that if you don’t know where you’re going, you’re lost. With no clear line of sight, you will be running into the car ahead of you, down undesirable side roads, and rocketing into ditches. Do yourself a favor. Paint a vivid picture of the future, and start living it. Now. You’ll not only get there faster, you’ll enjoy the whole adventure much, much more.