As I founder myself, I understand the value of feeling driven. It can help you produce much more than the people around me and much of the time that can be very helpful.
But sometimes I can’t turn it off. And I notice that I can’t actually say what’s driving me. It’s hidden. I’ll say it is for the sake of the business, or the mission, or the vision.
But is it?
Maybe what I really want is to be noticed. Or to be liked. Or to feel like I have enough, or AM enough.
We All Have Drives
Some of these drives we call addictions.
What’s the difference between a drive and an addiction? Simply put, I’d say that I have some level of control over my drives. They feel a bit more conscious, and a bit more in my power to honor or not, to employ or to take a break from.
My addictions feel more like they have me.
As an example, I did a video this week where I explored this in a bit more detail. I was walking uphill with a weighted backpack on a snowy road with my dog.
I’m huffing and puffing pretty hard. I’m unshaven and sweaty.
Why did I do that?
Because I get some of my best thinking when I am exercising. So I decided to pull out the phone and take a video in the midst of that thought. I didn’t want to miss it. It became the basis of this post.
Exercise, for me, is a tool. It clears my head and makes my body feel better in the process. I am driven to exercise but I am also in control of that drive and able to use it in a way that benefits me.
But I know people who are addicted to exercise. Especially in a mountain town in Colorado. Who use exercise almost like some people use alcohol or other drugs.
To avoid feeling things they don’t want to feel.
When A Drive Becomes A Ghost In The Machine
And that, to me, is where the line is. What do you avoid feeling, over and over again? And what is your strategy for avoiding it?
I had a client early in my coaching days who ran his own business. I asked him how much he wanted to make in his business and he could not identify a number.
As we talked about his childhood, he shared that for most of it his parents had struggled with money. That much of the time, his room had no heat in the winter.
His ghost was the drive for money. He had never had enough when growing up and even today, there is no amount that will make him feel safe.
What he longed for was to be ok with what he has, which by any reasonable measure is plenty.
For him, working more was his ghost. He could not stop. His fear would not let him.
There are addictions that everyone frowns on. Food, drugs, hoarding.
There are others though, like fitness and work, that are often celebrated in our culture, even though they can be just as destructive. (And are just as useful if the goal is to avoid feeling something.)
What is the fear that you don’t want to feel? What is the ghost that’s helping you to avoid it?
Going Deeper
Does that resonate?
If so, reach out to me and I will send you a special video that goes even deeper.
More and more founders like you are coming out of the spiritual closet and seeing their work as a vital personal journey to both abundance and meaning.
This is what I write about. For founders, for original thinkers, no matter where they are in their transformation.
The world needs YOU, in all your brilliance and imperfection.
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http://bit.ly/creatingextraordinarycoaches
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