Close your eyes.
Well no, don't actually close your eyes – otherwise you won’t be able to keep reading – but, you catch my drift.
The world is spinning in a Wizard of Oz-like fashion and with a bump, we land. Unlike The Wizard of Oz, nobody’s had a house land on top of them. Phew.
We're not in Kansas anymore. We've gone back in time, to the day you decided to start your business, in all it’s radiant, technicolour glory.
The reason you wanted to create your company…
The problem you wanted to solve…
The need you were moved to fulfil…
It’s all as searingly clear as the candy-coloured flowers swaying in the Munchkinland breeze.
So, what is your mission?
Time dulls the colour of our memories. The technicolour film fades to sepia. Can you define your mission as clearly today as the day you stepped into Oz?
It takes work to remember. Constantly, we have to refresh our memories. In my own business,
I am on a mission to write marketing copy that connects customers with the people that can solve their problems.
I’ll be totally honest. I had to dig out my strategy documents and double-check that before I committed it to paper.
A mission is not the adventure it sounds; knowing where you are headed is only half the battle.
Your mission is the good you're striving for, the golden (emerald?) destination that you see in your mind’s eye, somewhere beyond the deep, dark beyond. Your mission is the yellow brick road that keeps moving you forwards. Sure, you know where you’re headed. But your job is to keep your eyes on that yellow brick road, to do your best not to lose sight of it, even when different characters pop up, or when the path winds through a dark forest.
You can’t control the Wicked Witch of the West
Try as you might to stay focused, stuff happens. Sometimes it feels like the whole world wants to lure you off your yellow brick road. Maybe a customer has a crisis, or there’s a global pandemic. Perhaps your IT goes kaput, or the Winged Monkeys fly you away to the Wicked Witch’s castle. No? That’s just me then…
Despite your best intentions, no matter how noble your mission, you lose sight of the yellow brick road. You find yourself hacking through undergrowth, cut off from the path that you want to be on.
The Emerald City is glinting in the distance
So, my question to you, is: can you articulate your mission?
Do you recognise the path, or have the dirty leaves blown so far over the yellow brick road it's no longer yellow? How are you going to rediscover your mission? What happens if – even after you’ve swept away all the leaves – your yellow brick road is obscured by a thick layer of moss?
Don’t panic.
Remember, you had that day in technicolour. That moment – when the drab reality peeled back – really did exist; the moment, when the world was revealed as it could be, truly happened.
That moment belongs to you.
My cry to Glinda the Good Witch – that’s you!
You have magical powers. You set the mission in the past. At the very beginning of the story, you laid out the rules. You, you made it clear where you were going.
Because the truth is, when you run your own business, you play every part. You’re not a Hollywood starlet with a raft of supporting stars to make you shine. You’re Glinda. You’re Dorothy. You’re the Tin Man, The Wizard and, yep, even Toto.
As Glinda the Good Witch, you sent that questing part of you off, like Dorothy, on a mission. You told the adventurer where to go, and you shod her in sparkling slippers. With one instruction ringing loud and clear you put the wheels in motion for something brilliant to unfold: follow the yellow brick road.
I urge you to reconnect with that mission
Write it down. Strive for it every day. And once you’ve done that? Hit reply and tell me what it is. I’d love to see your yellow brick road shining brightly.
And if you need a little help to articulate it, or to clarify your thoughts, get in touch anyway. I can help. I do live in the West, and I do get by using words and incantations to make things happen. Though I promise, I’m not the Wicked Witch. I’m simply a business owner, like you, who wants you to know that…
Your words matter,
Laura
Love this!