This is not a letter about regret.
This is not a letter about anxiety.
Seth Godin, quoting another, says "Anxiety is feeling Failure in Advance."
What I'd like to speak about is the opposite feeling.
What is the opposite of anxiety?
Effectiveness.
So let me flip this around. "Effectiveness is Feeling Success in Advance."
Effectiveness is making a decision without questioning.
Effectiveness is making the sale, before the conversation.
Effectiveness is doing what must be done with calm and clarity and without self-doubt.
I recently asked a client of mine a question, which is pertinent to this conversation.
"At which specific point does it become inevitable that the sale will be made?"
What is done, is done, before it is done.
Do you believe in "Love at First Sight?"
How is it that such a thing could exist?
How is it that a single glance could set off a series of events which lead to a committed relationship?
Because in that single moment, in the mind of both parties, a commitment and decision were made.
This decision, if mutual, places the relationship much further along than a first date.
It is done, before it is done.
And this is the true feeling of effectiveness.
To have a genuine feeling, which is instructive of what's to come.
To sense hours before you give a talk that it has already gone well.
To feel the day before a job interview that the job is already yours, and now you're considering whether or not you choose to accept it...
"Effectiveness is Feeling Success in Advance."
xx David