We are so creative that we miss how creative we are. How powerful we are.

Quantum physicists tell is that the world “out there” is a just an indeterminate haze of possibilities until a conscious being observes it.

At that moment, in a process called “quantum collapse,” one of the myriad possibilities emerges, driven in large part by what the conscious being expects to see.

(This is how Schroedinger’s Cat can be both dead and alive at the same time.)

Your brain takes information from your sense organs and combines it with your own history and beliefs and creates a model of reality and you live in that model. Scientists tell us, for example, that only about 20 percent of what we see is new information. The rest is reconstructed in our brains based on past experience.

Every person does that for themselves. Every person is living in their own reality.

There is no separately existing objective reality—only the quantum collapse that each observer creates.

You are creating your model just as I am creating mine. Your entire life you are creating a model and then living in that model as if it is solid and real.

And yes, creating yourself as someone who is not creative is one of the possibilities. But given you can create anything, can choose any of myriad possibilities, why on earth would you create that one?

It takes a certain amount of confidence to be a founder. Some would even call it arrogance.

The audacity to believe that you have a better idea. To believe that starting your own thing, on your own or even as a bigger company, is the best way to bring that better idea into the world.

I had that idea for me. I called it Creating Extraordinary Futures™.

But the Creating Extraordinary Futures that I created in 2017 and what exists today are incredibly different.

Because I also needed humility. The humility to change, to pivot, to adjust.

To see who my ideas resonated with and who they clearly did not. To see how I could make my ideas easier to understand for those who were interested. To continue to adapt the Creating Extraordinary Futures Process™ as my thinking changed and as more clarity emerged.

I see this with my clients, too.

They might start with arrogance, but if they think they have it all figured out, they will likely fail.

People want a road map. So much so that they will blindly follow those who claim to have one.

There is no map. There is no predefined path. What worked for entrepreneur extraordinaire will not work for you. Because you are a different person. You need to find your own way, as I found mine.

You say you want clarity, but the only clarity I know of is the clarity of knowing what to do next. Of taking the very next step.

If you are looking for that kind of clarity, let’s talk.

One of the reasons that I love coaching is actually quite selfish.

I am in a constant search for truth. I have been my whole life. It is why I went to law school. It is one of the things that led me to meditation and working with spiritual teachers. To getting a coach and then becoming one.

Socrates had it right when he focused on learning through dialogue. Because there are things that come up in conversation that I have not seen come up in any other way.

I already know what’s in my head. I hear it over and over again. But to expose myself to what is in another human being’s head, and soul?

That is when the insights come. Sometimes those insights are for the client, but often they are for me.

Even when I am talking to a camera, there is a person in that camera lens who I am in conversation with. I am guided toward what that person might need from me. Through some mysterious process, I am teaching and learning from a person I may not have even met yet.

I don’t pretend to understand this process. But I do honor it. And I know that there is nothing more powerful to learn new things about myself, and the world.

What have you seen through conversation that you have not seen before?

A founder once told me that most new businesses don’t actually fail. Instead, the founder simply runs out of time, or money, or enthusiasm.

Giving yourself enough of all of those is critical to maximizing your chances of success. But persistence still plays an incredibly important role.

At every step of my own journey, choice points arose as to whether and how to continue the business, when to bring on other people, when to scale.

These are not easy choices and I’m never quite sure I’ve made the correct ones (or even that there is a correct choice).

But there are a few questions that I have learned to ask myself along the way. Even now, seven years into my coaching business, the answers to these questions still help be decide where to focus and what to say no to.

1. Do you still enjoy the process?

Do you enjoy doing what you need to do every day to build the business? For example, I have had other coaches ask me about my “social media strategy,” and I really don’t have one. Instead, I create both written and video content that reflects as accurately as it can what I currently believe AND what I have observed works for my clients. I enjoy the internal process of uncovering that truth and trust that the right people will resonate with what I have created.

2. Given what you have learned, does your goal still seem possible to you?

You must continue to believe that the goal, whatever that is, remains possible for you. Even inevitable. Every day you must act as it achieving your goal is inevitable. And if you cannot, it might be a sign that it is time to move on.

3. Do you still want what’s on other side?

Occasionally, I discover that I don’t really like working with a particular type of client or a particular type of organization. There used to be a side of me that thought that, for the sake of the business, or the money, I still needed to take on that work. I have learned, though, that focusing on the work that I truly want to do, with leaders that inspire me, is worth so much more than the money I might make doing something I am not as inspired by. And generally, the increased focus means that my business ends up growing, not declining.

4. Do you have the resources to keep going?

If you don’t have the time or money to continue, can you get them? If the idea is still promising, and the belief is still there, you must find the resources, or the regret will be unbearable.

What are the questions that have helped you know when to keep going, and when to stop?