Credit: Paramount Pictures
Gumptionable is a combination of conventional gumption with Gumption, and means being 100% personally responsible for your actions and interactions. Today we’ll examine the 2nd of the 7 principles of being gumptionable: Practice spirited presence.
And to complete the gumptionable series, here are links to all that’s been previously written about the other six principles: one, three, four, five, six, and seven.
From the original post on being gumptionable, Practicing spirited Presence is described as:
To be in the moment is to focus all one’s energy and attention toward a given activity. To do so in a spirited manner is the difference between lackadaisical and enthusiastic.
Here are 6 ways you can practice spirited presence and become more enthusiastic (and less lackadaisical) in all that you do:
1. Integrity
Integrity is how others perceive you based on the promises you make (and keep). Forrest Gump said, “A promise is a promise!” Lt. Dan said, “I’m a man of my word.”
Do you make promises in a lackadaisical manner?
Do you keep your promises with enthusiasm?
2. Receptiveness
Receptive people are open, interested, and nonresistant to others and their ideas. But you can’t be receptive if you’re not first present.
Spirited presence is only possible when you are enthusiastic. Lackadaisical presence is what we mean when someone says, “Don’t just sit there like a bump on a log.”
Do you honor others by being enthusiastically receptive to their ideas?
Or are you paying homage to burls by being a glorified bump on a log?
3. Choice
Everything we do is a choice. To be or not to be present is your choice.
W. Clement Stone said, “Be careful the environment you choose for it will shape you; be careful the friends you choose for you will become like them.”
Is your environment conducive to being present, focused, and in the moment?
Do your friends elevate your enthusiasm, or do they lean towards lackadaisical?
4. Opportunities
Opportunities can be taken or not taken. Just like when the feather lands at the foot of Forrest Gump … opportunities need to be picked up and taken.
Lackadaisical folks miss opportunities. They fail to see them when they land at their feet. Enthusiastic (and optimistic) people are looking for opportunities with eyes wide open … they see opportunities where opportunities barely exist.
Are your eyes mostly open or mostly closed?
What recent opportunity did you pick up directly as a result of your enthusiasm?
5. Adversity
It happens! Life isn’t fair. Obstacles always arise. Adversity is not within our control. Dealing with adversity is a part of life.
Present people know adversities are a part of life. Present people see setbacks coming and deal with obstacles in a proactive and focused manner. Lackadaisical folks seem both surprised and not surprised by setbacks. They’re surprised because they fail to anticipate and see them coming … they’re not surprised because setbacks fulfill their expectation that something always comes up that prevents their dreams from becoming a reality.
Are your expectations around adversity helping or defeating you?
Do you face adversities with enthusiasm?
6. Communication
Communication is the act or process of interchanging thoughts, opinions, or information. The best communicators are fully conscious of (and present to) their audience, their message, and their role in the communication process. Lackadaisical is nowhere to be found.
Susan Rabin said, “Enthusiasm is contagious. Be a carrier.”
Does your presence communicate a lackadaisical disease?
Or does your presence shout and infect others with enthusiasm?
Being present 24/7 is impossible. But practicing spirited presence is very possible and absolutely necessary in today’s business world. Our employers and clients demand our focus and enthusiasm.
Lackadaisical is yesterday’s story and part of the malaise we’re currently feeling in our sputtering economy. Getting refocused, participating in the moment, and practicing spirited presence is our new minimum for success.
Are you focused?
Are you participating in the moment?
Are you practicing spirited presence?
Next Blog Title: Stories of Gumption – John Grabowski
Next Blog date: March 31, 2011