I have a powerful, praying wife. I defer to her prayers most of the time. On one occasion, however, my 10-year old son’s flag-football team was playing against the best team in the region. Most of the kids on my son’s team had never played before and the opponent was a travel team with bigger, faster, more skilled, and experienced athletes and had been beating teams by 5-6 touchdowns.
Our coach came up to my wife and I to tell us what we were up against that day and I agreed that we were likely going to get throttled. My wife told us we were both being negative and she was certain we were going to win this game. While the coach and I both appreciated her faith and positive attitude very much – we also knew we’d have to trade that positivity in for talent, skill, and preparation if we were going to have a chance. On a positive note, we only lost by 3 touchdowns.
Famed author and business guru, Robert Fritz is known for his research in “structural dynamics” – the study of how structural relationships impact behavior in both individuals and organizations.
Fritz points out that if you want to truly grow and sustain that growth in business or anywhere in life, you have to create a newer, better structure. Thus, the difference in your current reality and your desired reality is based on the different structures they are built upon. A change in structure is the primary indicator of reaching (and happily) sustaining next level success.
Health is a great example of Fritz’s postulate. If you want to go from your current level of health and fitness to the next, you need better structure. You can’t build better and more sustainable future well-being with the same subluxated spine, toxic diet, and/or lack of exercise that make up the infra-structure of your current life. The difference between where you are now and where you want to be will be the necessary change to the structure. You can be as optimistic as you’d like about your health or try to improve with drugs, but if it’s built on a subluxated spine, fried food, and 3-4 hours of Netflix on the couch every day; that structure will not hold up.
The underlying structure of anything determines its behavior. In other words, you are not able to build a high rise building on the infrastructure of a trailer home. You may want to turn your lemonade stand into the Coca Cola Companies, the most recognizable brand in the world, but it won’t happen with the same mindset, skill-set, and business model (infra-structure).
MANY PEOPLE ARE TRYING TO ADD NEW SERVICES, PRODUCTS, OR SOCIAL MEDIA TO THE SAME STRUCTURE AND FAILING TO SEE ANY REAL OR SUSTAINABLE GROWTH OR SUCCESS.
The will is subservient to the skill. You may really want something, but if you do not build, create, and acquire the skills then you will simply lack the infra-structure necessary to get it. Your great will just simply turns in to great frustration and the bigger, faster, more experienced team will beat you by at least 3 touchdowns.
Your frustration to growth and to more easily sustain your life or business is likely caused by blind-spots you have relative to your structures. If any of us think it ain’t broke, we’re blind – to the limitation of our current structure.
If things are not where you like them, but it seems like you’re making all of the right moves; you have a structural blind-spot. Blindness to seeing better foundations is tough, but the only path to the future.
“Path of least resistance: Have to take structural laws into account in order to succeed. If you lay new ideas on existing framework, you will always go back to the path of least resistance.“ – Robert Fritz
The gap between where you are and where you could be is enough to change the world!
Dr. Ben
