June 2018 - Beyond the Crucible by Warwick Fairfax

Moving Forward

A vision is often borne amidst a crucible experience. The seeds of hope can sometimes be found amidst pain and despair. How can this be? A crucible experience is like a shock to the system. The loss of a business, getting fired, a health challenge can all rock our world. A crucible experience causes us to take stock. We ask ourselves what is life all about? What is my purpose? Where am I going? What was I designed for?

To move forward, we need to find a vision that is uniquely ours. To make forward progress, we need to understand how we are wired. We need to know what are our innate gifts; what are our passions, beliefs and values.

Anchored by a deeper understanding of our crucible experience, which may include learning from mistakes we have made, and more fully appreciating who we are and how we are wired, we are in a good place to move forward.

Your Vision is Your Mission

We need to ask ourselves what truly matters to us in life. What are we passionate about? What cause or mission do we believe that we should give our all to? How does that cause or mission line up with our unique wiring and gifting? What role should we play in this mission? How does that role fit with who we are?

Notice how I am viewing a vision as a mission, part of something beyond ourselves. A vision that is in keeping with leading a life of significance has to have a sense of mission from our perspective. A vision that is anchored by our deeply held beliefs and passions will have staying power.

Bringing a vision to reality is not easy. There will be many obstacles. But if that vision is anchored by deeply held beliefs and passions, it is far more likely that we will have the motivation, the staying power, to keep going, to bring that vision to reality.

Vision Overcomes Conventional Wisdom

Walt Disney was one of the great visionaries. He was a serial visionary. He had many ideas that people at the time thought made no sense. Disney made a feature length cartoon in color called Snow White. At the time the conventional wisdom was that no one would come to see a feature length cartoon and take it seriously, at a time when cartoons were typically light hearted short animated features. Snow White premiered in Los Angeles in 1937 with some of the biggest stars in Hollywood present. When Snow White is presumed dead, the audience of Hollywood stars were wiping the tears from their eyes. At the end of the movie, they all stood and cheered.

Walt Disney went on to make many feature length movies, as well as launching Disneyland in California in 1955, and laid the groundwork for Walt Disney World in Florida, which opened in 1971 after Disney’s death.

One key moment earlier in Walt Disney’s career, happened on a train from New York to Los Angeles in 1928. Disney had gone to New York to ask the distributor of his cartoons to movie theaters for more money for his Oswald the Lucky Rabbit cartoons. But when Disney arrived in New York, he found the distributor had secretly hired away almost all of his animators and had inserted some fine print in the contracts saying that Oswald the Luck Rabbit belonged to the distributor. One the train back to Los Angeles, rather than sinking into anger or despair, Walt Disney got out his yellow legal pad and began sketching a series of circles. His sketches became Micky Mouse.

Vision + Perseverance = Achieving the Impossible

Disney did not wallow in his misfortune or beat himself up for not realizing what the distributor was doing to him. He kept on going. Few have heard of Oswald the Lucky Rabbit. The whole world has heard of Mickey Mouse.

Walt Disney illustrates the key attribute of dealing with a crucible experience. He kept going, and did not let this misfortune hold him back. I am sure there were lessons to be learned, such as reading contracts more closely, and being careful which business partners you trust. These are important lessons.

But Disney knew what he loved and was good at, making cartoons and constantly innovating. His vision would grow from cartoons, to feature length movies, to theme parks. Disney never gave up. Disney had this phrase that shows a great mindset for making a vision happen, “It’s kind of fun to do the impossible.”

Reflection

What vision is a mission that you truly care about?

How does that vision fit your unique wiring, passions and beliefs?

Do you care enough about the mission of this vision, that you feel you will overcome obstacles come what may?

To explore Beyond the Crucible resources, including our free Trials-to-Triumphs Self-Assessment, visit beyondthecrucible.com.

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Discovering Your Design

A crucible experience is often searing. The loss of a job or business, a health or family challenge can make us feel like our world has changed forever. We can feel like our lives are over. But a crucible experience can reveal seeds of hope. Out of our pain, can come a vision to help others. In our misfortune, there may be clues as to how we are designed. Sometimes the reason a job or business did not work out was because we were not doing what we were designed for. Perhaps we were a round peg in a square hole. We didn’t fit.

Even if the crucible experience was not your fault such as with a health challenge or losing a parent at a young age, it will still tend to impact us to our core. We ask what life is all about? Why am I here? What is my purpose? Perhaps even, what was I designed to do?

You Have Unique Wiring

Our purpose, our place in the world is inextricably linked to how we were designed. We all come out of the box a certain way with certain innate gifts. We maybe artistic or athletic. We may have a gifting for math and science or english and history. Our innate gifts can be nurtured and influenced over time, but there is some unique wiring we start out with.

Overlaid on our innate gifting, are our passions, values and beliefs. This may be influenced by our family, our childhood experiences, our culture or experiences we have along the way.

A crucible experience can force us to look at who we are. But we can’t figure out where we are going, until we know who we are. A life of significance must be based on who we are.

A life of significance that is tied to our innate gifting, overlaid with our passions, values and beliefs is like rocket fuel. Being more truly us with a vision that flows out of the core of who we are, can give us unstoppable motivation and momentum. But a vision, however noble, that is not tied to who we are, what we believe in and what we are passionate about will tend to go nowhere.

You Can’t Inherit a Vision

In a sense that is my story. I had a vision of restoring the family media company I grew up in Australia to the ideals of the founder. I wanted it to be well run. That was a compelling vision, one that I thought was a noble, even honorable vision. But was this my vision? It was more my father’s vision, and ultimately John Fairfax’s vision (my great great grandfather who started the family business). One thing I have learnt is that you can’t inherit a vision.

What was needed to accomplish the vision, was a take charge leader. That was not me. I am more of a reflective adviser. I like to be part of a team, such as being a member of the boards I am on. I like to write and to advocate for principles I believe in. But a take charge leader, making hundreds of decisions every day, hiring and firing. That is not me. I am more of a contemplative person than an action person.

All this to say, I was pursuing a vision, however noble, that was more my father’s and my great great grandfather’s vision than mine. To bring about the vision required skills and aptitude that were not me. I was not designed for the task that needed to be done.

What I do now lines up so much better. I am an advocate for principles of leadership that I strongly believe in, as well as a reflective adviser, writer and executive coach.