Is this the lifeblood of your business?

I remember listening to the fog horns at night.
Eerie, haunting, yet welcome voices in the quiet of the dark children’s dormitory.

I would lie in bed, and think of how much I loved those things called fishcakes.
And how the song on the radio reminded me of the pretty little girl who slipped into the rock pool today…
crying and splashing about amongst the crabs we were hunting.

But most of all, I hoped my Mum would come this weekend and take me home from this convalescent place.
This beautiful, but alien, place in Broadstairs, Kent.

When you’re just seven years old…
There’s very little that you’re in control of.
And Hope is such a large part of your life.

Hope.

It drives so much of our striving each day, doesn’t it?
Sometimes, it’s about all we have, when logic and data doesn’t deliver the answers we want.

When you look at the crazy world around you;
The bigoted, angry, polluted, destructive world around you…
It’s so easy to become cynical, and retreat to our tested routine that keeps us safe… but not really alive and meaningful.

But it is Hope – almost delusional – that gets us business owners and leaders out of bed, ready to do ridiculous and unheard of things.

It’s Hope that helped us look at our ranting, self-consumed teenagers, and see the magnificent adults now developing in front of our eyes.
It’s Hope that guides my hand to avoid buying that single-use plastic bottle, even though millions are choking the oceans each day.
It’s Hope that powered Wendy to lead expeditions to build water towers and Grandma’s Garden projects in Africa.

It’s Hope that paints pictures in my head of the wonders our little business can launch into the world next month, next year.

It was Hope that brought a young couple to me, determined to be coached, yet unclear about how they could find the money.
And then, four years later, seeing their revenue multiplied by 10 times.
Whilst mapping out dreams to take the world by storm.

Being around such Hope is a tonic.
Being around those who are simply marking time in their business sucks the energy clean out of our bodies.

What’s also interesting about Hope is this:

When I use it to help me in helping others…
that Hope increases.
It infects those around me.
And then it washes right back over me.
Until my own Hope is multiplied.

Hope.
It’s a miraculous, often unsung, frequently underestimated, power.

So…
I’m sitting here, in my Garden Office.
The Autumn bees have plenty to work on around our blazing garden.
My Thinking Bench is just eight feet to my left.
And I’m wondering…

What wildly optimistic, illogical Hope for your business are you carrying in your breast today?