Every Wednesday morning, Kev and I hold a group video meeting for our 5% Mastermind group.
It’s good to see people’s faces between our in-person quarterly events to hear how they’ve got on in the previous week, and give them a boost of coaching and encouragement for the week ahead.
Until recently, one particular face was missing, and all we saw was a black rectangle with his initials on it.
“I just can’t seem to get my bloody camera to work!” he said, “I can’t work out why it doesn’t turn on - I’ve been on all the help screens, and gone through all the steps but it just won't work.”
Now, of course, that’s exactly what I’d say to someone if I was caught out jumping on a call at the last minute still in my jammies with toast and marmalade around my face, but this guy seemed to have the same problem week after week, even though he obviously knew when the calls were - it wasn’t like we were catching him off guard.
A couple of weeks ago, he popped up on the call in full technocolour.
“Wow! It’s you! You got your camera to work!”
It was kind of a big deal, because it had become a running joke about how he was The Invisible Man, and The Voice from the Blackness.
“I finally worked it out!” he said, looking very chuffed with himself, “The camera was actually on a slider, and it was hidden inside my laptop. I just needed to pull it out!”
“I had been asking the wrong question ‘How do I turn the camera on?’ and I changed it to ‘Where is the camera?’ and just like that, the mystery was solved.”
I asked him if I could share this story, because it’s a brilliant example of how we can get stuck down a train of questioning that doesn't seem to yield any answers.
Our coach, Paul, says one of the questions he has changed recently is “How do I do this?” to “Who could help me get this done?”
Is there a better question you need to ask yourself today?
Maybe it goes even beyond the how and the who to why?
Why did you choose your current plan of action, and what could you have done differently?
Often, an even more profound question is “If not now, when?”
When will you start going to the gym?
When will you quit the work that’s breaking you?
When will you get stuck into that new project?
If you’re in business and you know you could be asking yourself better questions, then book a discovery call with me to see if we’re a good fit to work together.
When would be a good time to get a handle on your business and personal life?
Hmmm…I wonder…