Why a blog?
It took me a long time to determine what format I wanted this to take. Should it be a book? a podcast? maybe it should be white paper? Eventually I settled that it should be a blog of sorts. As much as I like the grandiose idea of having a book out there with my name on it, I don’t think its the right approach for this particular content. As least not right now, maybe at some point as this takes shape.
What is this blog about?
Have you ever been working on a project or dealing with a situation where you suddenly find yourself on your own with no help? I’m not talking about having no help until Monday. I’m talking about having no one to call to even intelligently brainstorm the problem(s) let alone provide guidance and answers. For all practical purposes you are on your own, you are stranded, you are on an island. It happens more often than you think and its likely you are still reading because you have experienced this stranding before. If you haven’t you should definitely stay because it will happen eventually. Its much like the old motorcycle saying, “There are two kinds of motorcycle riders, those who have crashed and those who are gonna crash.”
This blog is about how people end of on an island, what they did about it, and how they eventually escaped. No, I’m not talking about a literal island! I’m talking about that moment were you realize that you are on your with a project or situation. You may have gotten their through your own choices, maybe through the choices of others, or a mix. Regardless, you are on your own and having to navigate this thing. While you aren’t like to starve to death because of a project gone wrong it can still have long reaching consequences. Depending on the project or situation it can effect your employee, client relationships, personal relationships, career prospects, dating prospects, and even your living situation. When I say effect, keep in mind, I am talking about every outcome whether that is positive or negative. My goal here is to bottle those real world situations to find the common thread. My goal is to give everyone as many maps to as many islands as possible. My goal, at the end of it all, is to teach out how to quickly make our own maps. If we all pull together our knowledge we can all become masters of the high seas, unthwarted by any miscalculation.
Let’s test the premise . . .
So this blog represents several years of careful thought about how people end up on an island. On an island fending for themselves, fight circumstances that seem to want to accelerate their path to failure and demise. Through sheer force of will and ingenuity they triumph or fail. In every case a lesser person might not have made it so far, a person with fewer skills wouldn’t have survived the day. Surviving first contact is a victory in and of itself. In almost every situation they likely didn’t plan for this to occur. Every person comes through the other side changed, for better or for worse. They learn more about themselves and their skills than they ever knew. There will always be those that become lost and those that set up residence.
While there are a few that do it on purpose, most do not. Likewise there are those that volunteer to return. That’s right! They go back for seconds and even thirds. They become addicted to the challenge. They become the survivalists, the masters that teach the others, they bring us the fire, the food, the boat to leave. They are the ones that the moment the first blast of island air hit their face a calm passes over them. They already know how they will escape. They will leave that island in a boat crafted to hold any survivors they find along the way and will be well fed and happy. Happily looking forward to the next stranding.
Those people have a screw loose in my opinion!
Or do they?