The Invisible Mentor

Archive for 2010

Where has the 2010 gone? As subscribers to this blog already know, reading is one of life’s simple joy for me. I love to snuggle up with a good book. Science fiction is not a genre that I really like so I have been forcing myself to read more because I think it’s important to stretch myself. I ask you all the time to do so, so it’s important for me to follow the advice that I dispense. Next on my science fiction reading list is the Foundation Trilogy: Foundation, Second Foundation and Foundation and Empire by Isaac Asimov.

Here are 10 book reviews that I did this year:

1. Innovate The Steve Jobs Way
2. Review: Briefcase Essentials by Susan T. Spenser
3. Have You Found Your Acres of Diamonds?
4. Review of Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
5. Review of Linchpin – Are You Indispensable by Seth Godin
6. How to Build a Successful Business by Doing These 10 Things?
7. Want Presentations That Rock? Joey Asher’s 15 Minutes Including Q & A Delivers
8. Review of the Prophet by Kahlil Gibran
9. Review of the Skinny on Networking: Maximizing the Power of Number by Jim Randel
10. Review of Books That Changed the World by Andrew Taylor

How can you use this information? What do you have to add to the conversation? Let’s keep the conversation flowing, please let me know your thoughts in the comments section below. Many readers read this blog from other sites, so why don’t you pop over to The Invisible Mentor and subscribe (top on the right hand side) by email or RSS Feed.

Book links are affiliate links.

This is Part Two of this week’s workshop. Whether or not you are an artist there are many lessons for you to learn here today. In this section, some of the lessons you will learn from Patty Zuver are:

• Success isn’t about money, it’s about happiness, passion, love and things like that.
• Take time to laugh and don’t take yourself too seriously.
• Be happy and grateful for what you have.
• Appreciate the people in your life.
• Love the people around you.

Avil Beckford: Tell me a little bit about yourself.

Patty Zuver: I hate to say that I’m primarily a mother of three, but that’s what I am these days. I’m also an artist and a teacher. I teach art and English as a Second Language (ESL). I like art, movies and I like to travel.

Avil Beckford: How do you integrate your personal and professional life?

Patty Zuver: Not very well. I think like everyone, at this stage of my life, I’m 47 years old, with three kids and three jobs – I teach, I’m the Children’s Church Co-ordinator and I try to do my own art work. Something always falls through the cracks. I have piles of laundry, I have a messy house, and things like that. It’s always a constant struggle to find that balance. I don’t know if I have been good at it, though some weeks are better than others. Some weeks I think I’m so together and the following week things fall apart.

Avil Beckford: What’s a major regret that you’ve had in life?

Patty Zuver: Regret is such a funny thing because as I was saying a couple of questions ago, I think any mistake that might have been made or be seen as regrets are all a part of the past that has gotten me here, which is a pretty good place so I don’t know if I could look back and think of any glaring regrets.

Avil Beckford: What are five life lessons that you have learned so far?

Patty Zuver:

1. Not to take things so seriously, but to take your work seriously
2. Do not let other things influence you. Don’t take events too seriously, and take things in stride
3. Be happy for what you have
4. Try not to take people for granted
5. Love the people around you. That old cliché “People on their death beds never say, ‘Oh I wished I had become the President, instead of Vice President’ they always wished they spent more time eating dinner with their family, or playing a board game with their kids or things like that.”

Avil Beckford: When you have some down time, how do you spend it?

Patty Zuver: I like to go to movies and I really like to read. I read a ton so I would probably read.

Avil Beckford: What process do you use to generate great ideas?

Patty Zuver: Reading, looking at books about artists, reading about artists’ lives and looking at images that other artists have made. Going to see other art forms like films, or dance or music, music is a huge inspiration.

Avil Beckford: What’s your favourite quotation and why?

Patty Zuver: “Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate, Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure” by Marianne Williamson. A friend sent this to me at least ten years ago and I put it up in every studio space I have, even if it’s studio space that I rent for a couple of weeks.

Avil Beckford: How do you define success?

Patty Zuver: I don’t define success financially. I think success is doing what makes you happy, and so that may be working at Starbucks if you love working there and are the best barista in town. If you can go to bed happy every night with what you have done during the day, that’s success.

Avil Beckford: This is a related question, in your opinion, what’s the formula for success?

Patty Zuver: Follow your passions, follow your dreams. Someone can make $1 million dollars doing a crappy job and they are the ones who die of a heart attack when they are 60.

Avil Beckford: What are the steps you took to succeed in your field?

Patty Zuver: I don’t know if I have succeeded in my field (she laughs). I think it’s sticking to it, even if I have made only a total of $5 off my art my total life (she laughs again). There are certain points in my life when I thought, “Oh this is stupid, why do I even spend time or money on this.” But it is a love and a passion so I stick with it even if it wasn’t met with great success and glowing reviews, or fame or whatever those traditional markers of success are. I have three kids, and I do whatever bits I can, and I have had to have other jobs to support myself financially. But wherever I have been, I have always had a little corner where I could make art. Right now I’m working out of my basement, and sometimes it’s been a corner of the kitchen, but there has always been a space in my living space to make art.

Avil Beckford: What advice do you have for someone just starting out in your field?

Patty Zuver: Have confidence in yourself and follow what you know is right in your heart and gut, and don’t just follow trends or what others want you to do.

Avil Beckford: If trusted friends could introduce you to five people that you’ve always wanted to meet, who would you choose? And what would you say to them?

Patty Zuver:

1. Georgia O’Keefe
2. John Coltrane
3. Andrea Zittel
4. Sally Mann
5. Gabriel Garcia Marquez

I would ask all of them about their creative process. How do you create a piece of music like John Coltrane used to do? What went through his brain when he played the saxophone? How did Georgia O’Keefe see things the way she did?

Avil Beckford: Which one book had a profound impact on your life? What was it about this book that impacted you so deeply?

Patty Zuver: I think it is difficult to narrow it down to one book. I am a voracious reader. I love to read so I think there would be different books at different times of my life. On a list of those books I would put Catcher in the Rye or Franny and Zooey by J D Salinger. These two Salinger books are the first semi-adult books I read at an age where they spoke to me, and I thought, “Oh wow, this is kind of interesting.” Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude and In the Skin of a Lion by Michael Ondaatje also influenced me.

Avil Beckford: I didn’t “get” In the Skin of a Lion

Patty Zuver: Oh it’s fantastic, you didn’t get it? It’s very disjointed and almost like a painting, like a work of art. It sort of paints a picture and you have to look at it and interpret it. I know what you mean though, it’s not linear, it’s not here is the beginning of the story, the middle of the story, and I think you have to read it two or three times to get the whole thing.

Avil Beckford: If you were stranded on a deserted island, what are five books that you would like to have with you and why? Summarize the book in two sentences.

Patty Zuver:

1. Franny and Zooey
2. One Hundred Years of Solitude
3. In The Skin of a Lion
4. Jane Eyre
5. Some sort of art book

Avil Beckford: What one music CD and movie would you like to have with you (on the deserted island) and why?

Patty Zuver: If I had one CD ever that I had to listen to for the next 20 years – that’s another thing it has to be something that stands up –it would have to be John Coltrane’s Around Midnight.  It’s very hard to narrow it down to one movie. I think if it was only one, it would have to be something very visual like a Peter Greenaway film: The Draughtman’s Contract or Drowning by Numbers or a movie like Koyaanisqatsi or Raise the Red Lantern. All of these movies are very, very visual so I think I could see them all over and over. I guess if I had to choose one, it might be Raise the Red Lantern because it also deals with China…

If you cannot view the YouTube video of Around Midnight with Miles Davis & John Coltrane click here

Avil Beckford: What excites you about life?

Patty Zuver: I think creativity excites me, and that could be from a really good teacher, a really great piece of music, to people coming up with really interesting ideas, and having conversations with people about interesting ideas.

Avil Beckford: How do you nurture your soul?

Patty Zuver: Definitely music and reading!

Avil Beckford: If you had a personal genie and she gave you one wish, what would you wish for? Or, if I gave you a magic wand, what would you use it for?

Patty Zuver: I would wish for more time. I don’t know how, but five more hours in a day, and just in my day. No one else’s day, the whole world would stop for three or four hours and it would be just for me.

Avil Beckford: Complete the following, I am happy when…..

Patty Zuver: Things are running smoothly in my household because that frees me up to do what I want to do.

How can you use this information? What do you have to add to the conversation? Let’s keep the conversation flowing, please let me know your thoughts in the comments section below. Many readers read this blog from other sites, so why don’t you pop over to The Invisible Mentor and subscribe (top on the right hand side) by email or RSS Feed.

All book links are affiliate links.

I have known Patty Zuver for over 12 years, and during that time we have sat on committees, Co-Chaired committees, had lunch several times, and attended yoga classes together, but I find that even for people who I have known for a long time, whenever I interview them I learn so much more. I think it has to do with the questions that I ask, which really get to the heart of the matter. You get to see the whole person, and they are much more than what they do.

I have always viewed Patty as a very successful, talented artist, and I have attended some of her shows. In this interview which follows, get a notepad and pencil because it’s a workshop, another lesson in work and life from our network of mentors. You see real people living real lives that you can relate to.

Lessons from the interview

• You do not need external validation before you can move to the next level. As Patty says, “Take the bull by the horn.”
• Be confident and take risks.
• When things do not go quite the way you expected, look back and see what lessons you can learn.
• Stand up for, and stick to what you believe in.
• Failure is feedback, learn from it, and move on.

Avil Beckford: Tell me a little bit about yourself.

Patty Zuver: I hate to say that I’m primarily a mother of three, but that’s what I am these days. I’m also an artist and a teacher. I teach art and English as a Second Language (ESL). I like art, movies and I like to travel.

Avil Beckford: What’s a typical day like for you?

Patty Zuver: When I saw that question (I usually send the questions to the interviewees before the interview) I had to laugh because there is no such thing in my life as a typical day. I am a mother of three, and married to a musician, so both of us have very erratic schedules, and it’s not a typical Monday to Friday, 9 to 5 thing. So everyday before the two of us head out the door we sit down and say, “Okay what are you doing today? Who is going to pick up the kids? Who is going to make them lunch?” So a typical day for me involves a lot of childcare, a lot of packing lunches, a lot of making breakfasts, a lot of picking people up, and on a good day, it will include some studio time.

Avil Beckford: How do you motivate yourself and stay motivated?

Patty Zuver: This is a tough one, especially with the art, it is easy to get unmotivated when I have only short periods of time to work. I motivate myself by going out and looking at art, seeing what others are doing, whether it’s contemporary art or a trip to the AGO (Art Gallery of Ontario). Going to see a movie is always good, and so is exercise such as yoga and swimming.

Avil Beckford: If you had to start over from scratch, knowing what you know now, what would you do differently?

Patty Zuver: If I could talk to my 20 year old self now, I would give myself the confidence that I was good at what I did, that I was a decent artist and that I should have tried a bit harder or stuck to it longer. I have never given up art, but before getting a traditional teaching job I should have taken advantage of my youth a bit more. Everyone says that, “Youth is wasted on the young.” In general there isn’t a lot that I would have done differently, I’m pretty happy with where I am right now. While I would love my work to be hanging on some museum wall, like a lot of other 47 year olds, I’m not, but I’m pretty okay with that. So there isn’t a ton I would do differently, just be more confident when I was younger.

Avil Beckford: What’s the most important business or other discovery you’ve made in the past year?

Patty Zuver: About a year ago I had one of those sit downs and asked myself, “What are you going to do with your life?” kind of thing. As you know, a couple of years ago we went to China for three months, so when I came home I had the opportunity to regroup and figure out how I wanted to live the next couple of years. I decided that I really enjoyed teaching and that I am a good teacher so I decided to explore what was available in teaching. I got my ESL teaching degree, so I’m trying to work on that a little bit.

As far as my art is concerned, every now and again, about every five years or so I think I should be applying to galleries to have shows because that’s what you do as a mature artist. And once again I made the discovery that it’s much easier, and just as valid to rent a space at the Gladstone Hotel (Small, trendy hotel in Toronto) and pay your $200 for the night and put up your own art, invite your friends and have a good night, and hope you sell some art in the process. I have made that discovery again that you don’t need other people’s approval to do what you want to do.

Avil Beckford: What’s one of the biggest advances in your industry over the past five years?

Patty Zuver: Like most businesses, it’s probably the digital world. For instance, going back to applying for shows in a gallery, or for grants, or any of that kind of thing, so much of it is done digitally now. You have to submit all of your images on a CD and it has to be x number of pixels, and they are never consistent. The industry has changed tremendously where you would physically submit slides, and someone would put them in a slide projector and look at them, now everything is done digitally but it’s not standardized. So to apply for a grant you might have to submit images, say 2500 pixels by 2300 pixels, then you apply to a gallery and the digital images that you have from a grant that you applied for, you cannot use because they need either smaller or larger pixels.

I don’t know anything about digital photography, or how to make a CD, so every time I’m applying for a grant, I have to take it to Mr. Computer Guy, and tell him specifically what sizes my images need to be. I now have to bring another person into the process which I never used to have to do. Like any other business out there, the whole art world has changed dramatically because of digital images, even if you are not a digital artist you have to deal with it. I am in that cohort who missed the boat on learning how to use the computer.

Avil Beckford: The answer you just gave could apply to the next question, but what are the three threats to your business, your success, and how are you handling them?

Patty Zuver: Threat is such a strong word. Anyway, it costs a ton of money if I want someone to do a DVD or CD that I have to submit to people. Every step of the way it costs a little bit more money if you bring another person into your circle, into the process to help you do something. This chips away at your very small profit margin, so I guess the digital thing is a challenge, but I don’t know if I would consider it to be a threat.

It could very well be a threat to my “success” because every time I look at a call for artist, and you know the deadline is two weeks from now, you go, “I can’t get this together in two weeks because I have to take pictures of the images with a digital camera, which I don’t know how to do to begin with, and then I have to take them to some guy to put it on a CD.” And so I don’t apply because I don’t know how to get it all done within the two weeks and so I won’t get that show.

Threat is such a strong word that I don’t really see any to the art world.

Avil Beckford: What’s unique about the service that you provide?

Patty Zuver: As far as my art is concerned I don’t know because every artist is going to provide a unique perspective. For the past couple of years I’ve been dealing with scenes of grief and loss of what could be considered a home or home base. There are lots of artists who have dealt with those subjects, but I offer my personal perspective.

In terms of my teaching style, I think that I’m very personable. I’m creative and very open to my students, and not like the “queen” at the front of the classroom telling them all what to do.

Avil Beckford: Describe a major business or other challenge you had and how you resolved it.

Patty Zuver: I’ll go back to trying to get a show in a gallery a few years ago. I was thinking that I should become a “real artist” and have a show at a “real gallery” and da-da-da. I applications to galleries and got a bunch of rejections, and of course whenever you get rejected from anything, you take it personally, and you think, “Maybe I suck, maybe I am a crappy artist because no one likes what I’m doing.” So there is that period where you go home and lick your wounds.

After that I came to the conclusion that so what? I can rent a space, show my work and I know that my work is good. I know a lot of people who think the same thing and I know a lot of people who buy my work, so again you have to try to not get discouraged, especially in the art world because so much is based on fashion – and by fashion I don’t mean what people are wearing – and taste. If what you are doing is not considered cool right now, like if someone is doing figurative art and that’s not cool anymore, a gallery is not going to show them.

So just because what you are doing is not popular right now doesn’t mean you should stop doing it, and produce work that’s going to get you in the gallery. You have to stick to what you believe in, and do what you are going to do, regardless of fashions and popularity, and hopefully some day people will come around.

Avil Beckford: So coming to the realization that you can rent your own space and have your own shows, what kinds of lessons did you learn in the process?

Patty Zuver: If you think you are good, and enjoy what you are doing, then you are good, and there is going to be at least one other person out there who appreciates what you are doing

You don’t need the approval of the “cool” crowd. A lot of times when you face a challenge, you go right back to high school, where when you walked into the cafeteria and felt like no one wanted to sit at the table with you. A lot of times when you get rejected, you go right back to that space, “Oh my God I’m not the cool kid.”

Do what you know is right, and forge ahead with what you know is right, and what you know is good.

Avil Beckford: Tell me about your big break and who gave you.

Patty Zuver: Oh God, I don’t think I have ever had a big break (she laughs). In teaching, I guess it would have been way back. When I finished university I was working in a health food store and I worked with a guy who also worked at a Montessori school. He was talking about it one day and I thought, “Wow, that sounds really interesting, I’d like to learn more about that.” The following week he told me that they had an assistant who quit so they needed to hire an assistant. I worked at that Montessori school for a couple of years, and when I moved to Toronto I continued to work in Montessori schools, and did so for about 10 years. So I guess I can consider that a break.

In the art world I have to say that I haven’t been given any huge breaks. In high school there were two teachers – an art teacher and a photography one – who made me feel like I could have a career in art, that I should go and do it, that it wasn’t a fun thing to do in my spare time, that I was good at it, and should continue doing it. When I went to university, they encouraged me to study art instead of doing something like business.

Avil Beckford: Describe one of your biggest failures. What lessons did you learn, and how did it contribute to a greater success?

Patty Zuver: Failure is an odd word, and at this point in life I never look back and say, “Oh my God, that was a failure.” I do honestly look at anything that didn’t go as right as it could have, as a learning lesson. And maybe I didn’t look at it like that as it was happening, but very soon after I go okay, “What was learned from that?” and they say what doesn’t kill you make you stronger and I do believe that.  I’ve had a lot of challenges along the way, both personally and professionally, but I think I’ve learned from every one of them.

Had I not have any challenges up to now I would be very boring, and not very empathetic. Anything that goes slightly wrong you learn from it, and you learn that people are human and you are human too.

Avil Beckford: What has been your biggest disappointment in your life – and what are you doing to prevent its reoccurrence?

Patty Zuver: One of my biggest disappointments would be that I hoped that I would have been further, and more recognized in the “art world,” whatever that means. “Success” for artists comes earlier these days. People are getting huge exhibits directly out of grad school and that kind of thing. I’m 47 now, and in some ways, it’s viewed that if I’m not big yet that’s it, it’s over and I’ll never be a “famous” artist. I thought I would have been further ahead down that road than I am.

Now I am taking the bull by the horn and doing my own thing. I’m renting my own space and putting my work up, and not thinking that I have to rely on galleries to come and recognize me, or waiting for an art critic to come to one of my shows, and declare me to be the greatest thing since sliced bread. I go out and do it myself and be happy with what I have gotten done.

Avil Beckford: What’s one of the toughest decisions you’ve had to make and how did it impact your life?

Patty Zuver: I scanned the questions when you emailed them to me and I saw that one. My son Joe is a challenge of a kid, so he falls into one of those tough decisions. Right now my husband and I are trying to decide whether or not we should home school him. I would have to say that is what I am going through right now. This is one of the toughest decisions that I’ve had to make.

Joe has ADHD, and he has also been diagnosed with a form of Asperger Syndrome and all that stuff. But then again you may ask me the same question next week and I would respond with the tough decision that I am going through then.

Business decisions are tough, but they are not life altering tough, where I think personal decisions can alter your day-to-day existence.

Avil Beckford: What are three events that helped to shape your life?

Patty Zuver: The type of parents I had shaped my like – good, bad or indifferent. My parents did the best they could with what they were given, which was not very much. I had a pretty abusive dad, and my mom was a great woman but not a great mother. I wouldn’t say that I had a tough upbringing, but it was not loving or supportive. It toughened me up a bit to be raised by those two, which was not a bad thing because that influenced me greatly.

My art and photography teachers in high school pushed me to go to art school.

The third event was when I married Mike and moved to Canada. That impacted my life hugely, on a bunch of different levels.

Avil Beckford: What’s an accomplishment that you are proudest of?

Patty Zuver: Getting to this point in my life, and having three children is an accomplishment that I am proud of. One of those kids is a big challenge and just the fact that I have kept level headed about it is a big accomplishment. It’s a lot of work to have other people see him in an empathetic light. Another accomplishment I am proud of, is when we went to China a few years ago, to take that big risk and take my entire family to China was a pretty big accomplishment.

Avil Beckford: How did mentors influence your life?

Patty Zuver: It’s hard to say if I have had Mentors with a capital M, but if I look back at people who influenced my life it would be the two teachers who pushed me to believe that I could do something with art. They influenced me by giving me direction at a point in my life when I was floundering.

Avil Beckford: What’s one core message you received from your mentors?

Patty Zuver: I would say it’s confidence, the message would me you can do it kind of thing. This is very important especially in high school when you are at that vulnerable stage and think you suck at everything. So it’s great when someone comes along and says that you are a talented artist.

Avil Beckford: An Invisible Mentor is a unique leader you can learn things from by observing them from afar, in the capacity, what is one piece of advice that you would give to readers?

Patty Zuver: Have confidence and believe in what you do, and take risks with that level of confidence. There are very few things that can be considered Failure. A failure is a challenge; you learn from it and move on.

How can you use this information? What do you have to add to the conversation? Let’s keep the conversation flowing, please let me know your thoughts in the comments section below. Many readers read this blog from other sites, so why don’t you pop over to The Invisible Mentor and subscribe (top on the right hand side) by email or RSS Feed.

Recently there has been a lot of chatter online about The Science of Getting Rich by Wallace Wattles, and some gurus are offering programs that follow the principles outlined in the book, along with a copy of the book as a bonus. I read The Science of Getting Rich a few years ago, but I thought I would read it again with new lens. You have to read this book with an open mind, and the title of the book is often a turnoff for many. The book is not just about becoming wealthy in terms of money; it’s about living a fulfilled life and tapping into your true potential. It’s what true wealth is about.

Wallace Wattles is the godfather of the personal development field and he was a man ahead of his time. While reading The Science of Getting Rich I experienced a feeling of déjà vu, like I had been down this road before. And I had, his concept is essentially The Law of Attraction. Key to Yourself by Venice Bloodworth published in 1952, says many of the same things, in exactly the same way that Wattles said them. In the film The Secret, the book that the creator Rhonda Byrne refers to that impacted her, is The Science of Getting Rich. It’s fascinating to see where the Law of Attraction began, even if it wasn’t called that at the time.

Published in 1910, the author says in his book that it is abnormal not to want to be rich, because being rich is the only way you can realize your full potential, and that there is an exact science to getting rich, like algebra or arithmetic. Anyone who follows the law will become rich with mathematical certainty. To become rich, you have to do things a Certain Way.

Because the book was published a century ago, the language used may appear odd. He talks about Formless Stuff, Original Substance, Formless Living Substance, Formless Intelligence and so on. He is talking about what we refer to today as energy.

Even though Wattles focuses a lot on visualizing what you want, having a clear mental image, and behaving as if you already have what you want, taking personal action is stated outright in many sections. “When you know what to think and do, then you must use your will to compel yourself to think and do the right things… You must not rely upon thought alone, paying no attention to personal action. That is the rock upon which many otherwise scientific metaphysical thinkers meet shipwreck–the failure to connect thought with personal action.”

This time around, I enjoyed reading The Science of Getting Rich and I saw things I do not remember seeing before. Despite the name, it’s quite uplifting and inspiring, and it teaches many lessons such as a grateful heart, humility and thinking abundantly. Here are some takeaways from the book, which will appear familiar to you.

• Everything first started with a thought. You have to imagine what you want before it is manifested
• Everything is created from one thing, energy – in many different forms
• Man is capable of original thought and has the capacity to cause the creation of what he thinks about
• You have the ability to become who you want to be, and create what you want to create
• Take action now

• Live for the body, mind and soul – all are equally important for us to live fully
• People do best in a business that they like and that they have the necessary skills for, but getting rich is not dependent on any particular business
• Opportunity comes from different directions, and there is an abundance of opportunities. Go with the tide instead of swimming against it
• There is more than enough for all
• The way you do things is a result of the way you think about them
• You are in a better position to help others, if you first help yourself to realize your true potential
• Create instead of competing
• Give more in “use” value than you take in “cash” value. So if you sell a book, the content must have a higher value than the cost of the book
• Think big, think abundance and go for the grande
• The more grateful you are, the more you receive
• To become the best, surround yourself with the best

If you are knowledgeable about the Law of Attraction, the contents of The Science of Getting Rich will be familiar, but it would still be worth your while to read it to see where things began. It is important to look at a concept and see how it evolved over one hundred years. Did the concept of the Law of Attraction expand or contract during those one hundred years? After reading The Science of Getting Rich, I was reminded of the quote, which sums up the book, “Give a man a fish, feed him for a day. Teach him how to fish, feed him for a lifetime.” When we assist others to better their situations, we should do so in ways that will make a tangible difference in their lives. When we give people a process to follow, they can now help themselves.

Click here for a copy of The Science of Getting Rich. How can you use this information? What do you have to add to the conversation? Let’s keep the conversation flowing, please let me know your thoughts in the comments section below. Many readers read this blog from other sites, so why don’t you pop over to The Invisible Mentor and subscribe (top on the right hand side) by email or RSS Feed.

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What kind of year would you like to have in 2011? Do you want to blaze some trail? Or are you comfortable with the same-old, same-old and want to stay the course? Sometimes it’s quite difficult to step outside our comfort zone and do extraordinary things, perhaps we do not want to draw attention to ourselves because of the way we were brought up. But it’s possible for ordinary people to accomplish extraordinary feats, look at some of the interviewees that I bring you.

I have had some very ambitious, stretch goals that I have been trying to achieve for a couple of years now, but I am not making as much progress as I’d like. So this coming year I’m doing something very different. I have hired a mentor-coach who has accomplished what I am trying to accomplish. On our preliminary phone conversations, he asked me what I was trying to achieve, he was interested in what I wanted. That’s very important, because sometimes mentors, and not many of them, want you to see their way, and they want to take you where they want you to go. The best mentors do not do that, they are interested in where you’d like to go and help you to get there.

The mentor-coach who I will be working with understands exactly what I am trying to do, and he knows exactly how to get me there. He has a system which he has been using for many years. And the icing on the cake is that his values and mission align perfectly with mine. What he has accomplished in life resonates with me. It has been taking me ages to get to where I would like to go, so I have sought help, and I begin my incredible journey on January 4, 2011. Are you ready for 2011; and what will you do differently? Is there a mentor who can take you where you’d like to go? My words for 2011 are “Achievement on Steroids,” what are yours?

If you cannot view this YouTube video of ABBA’s Happy New Year click here.

If you need help determining your goals refer to 10 Questions to Ask and Answer Before 2010. How can you use this information? What do you have to add to the conversation? Let’s keep the conversation flowing, please let me know your thoughts in the comments section below. Many readers read this blog from other sites, so why don’t you pop over to The Invisible Mentor and subscribe (top on the right hand side) by email or RSS Feed.