Life! By Design_ 6 Steps to an Extraordinary You - Laura Morton [68]
When I first started my own business six years ago, my dear friend Nikki asked what my vision was for my new company. I described my ideas. Nikki listened closely as I spoke. When I finished, I thought I had given her a clear and precise picture of what I was trying to create.
“I noticed there are some elements missing from your vision, Tom. Would you like me to walk you through a visualization exercise to help you get a clearer, more detailed picture?” Nikki asked.
I was all for it. Nikki suggested I get comfortable and pointed to a chair across the room where I could relax and unwind. She told me to imagine a grounding cord coming from my spine and connecting me to the earth so I knew I would be safe. She suggested I create a beam of light to my right that I could grasp onto. It would be like an elevator that would take me both up and down.
She then directed me to see myself floating up beyond the building we were sitting in and into the clouds, where I could see the skyline of the city. She told me to keep floating upward, past the atmosphere, up to the stars, where I could look down at the little ball below that was Earth.
Once I felt comfortable, Nikki suggested I ride the beam of light back down to Earth. But when I returned this time, it would be twenty years into the future. She wanted me to notice the city I was seeing. Was it a different city than when I left? What did I notice about the skyline? How had it changed? And where was I about to land? Was it someplace new? Was it my home or an office or some other environment I had never been to before?
Once I hit the ground, I described what I saw. I’d landed in a university setting, more like what I imagine the Apple campus to look like rather than a major university such as UCLA. I could see lots of professional people running around among several buildings—an equal number of men and women as well as kids. It felt like its own little self-enclosed city. I realized that this was one of my universities that helped people live By Design.
When Nikki asked me to leave that setting and go to where I lived, I described a Spanish-style home on the beach. When I saw the house from the street, I couldn’t see if it was beachfront, but I could tell that the house was near the ocean because seagulls were flying overhead. My wife, Kathy, greeted me at the front door. She looked as beautiful as she did the day I married her. Nikki encouraged me to get present by engaging all five of my senses with what I was seeing. What did Kathy look like? What was Kathy wearing? How did the house smell?
When I walked through the front door, I noticed that I was in the courtyard. Twenty years into the future, I had some gray hair but looked pretty much the same. I was wearing a casual shirt, untucked, with shorts and sandals. When I looked out the window, I saw my son Michael holding a baby. When I realized it was his baby, my eyes welled up. Michael’s wife was there, along with my other son, Steven, having a great time as grown men. The collective joy I felt was overwhelming.
Finally, Nikki steered me toward having a conversation with my future self. I was excited by the opportunity to ask questions of myself twenty years from now. I began rattling off whatever came into my head:
What has the journey been like for the past twenty years?
What advice would you give me today to help me allow myself to organically get here versus forcing it?
What were some of the most important lessons you learned along the way?
What advice would you give me when I run into hardship?
What do the grandchildren call me?
At the end of the questions, I gave my future self a long hug and said goodbye to all my loved ones. I walked outside, found my beam of light, and brought myself back to the present.
The first time I did this visualization was one of the most powerful experiences I have ever had. I wrote down every detail of what I saw and felt. The essence of my original vision for my new company never changed, but I got more pieces of the puzzle, which allowed