Here’s the issue:  With the onward advancement of the Internet (it’s still growing!), the huge growth in the number of social networks available and the shift in general marketing characteristics, more and more of the general public is able to join with or voice with a wider variety of groups, associations, blogs, non-profits, churches, schools or charities.  Is there anything wrong with this?  Of course not!  Networking your company or charity or church is a great way to get the word out on what exactly it is that you are trying to accomplish, what message you want to release.  The challenge is not in getting your message out or getting your company recognized or even attracting people to join with you.  The challenge lies in getting people to willingly and authentically support you.  Due to the fact that so many people and companies are accessible to the public, it is quite simple to join up with and interact with and show support for those people and companies.  However, showing support is completely different from initiating support.  In other words, it is very easy for me to join a network, give them my email, my picture and some general information, but what happens then?  They have my show of support…they have my picture for crying out loud!  But do they have my full-on initiated support?  Am I willing to act when called upon?  Would I stand up for that blog or company or person in a public forum?  Would I buy their product?  Would I sell their product?

The next step is to initiate your support.  If you love something or someone…buy that something, sell that something or tell that someone (again, not yelling)!  Do not let your support be reduced to a picture and a name in a list of millions.  If you genuinely support someone, let them know that you are for them and then get behind them full force.  If you love a product, tell the world about it so that others can come to enjoy it too.  If you love a blog, subscribe to it and let your friends know that you love it.  If you attend a great church, let others in the community know that you attend a great church.  Don’t let your show of support go to waste…Initiate it into a moving, powerful and acting force.

Here is the challenge: Many visionaries, no matter how self-motivated (or whatever), never get their start-up…well…started up!  Blame it on, if your must, a lack of focus.

The new visionary, leader and entrepreneur all know that they can impact their community, city, state, country and world in a drastically positive and unique way.  They know (and believe!) that they can do something great.  They have the initiative, the proper attitude, the enhanced heart, the high flying mind set, the proper hair cut (what?).  In short, they have what it takes to really make a difference through their actions, business and perspective.  Yet for some reason they just can’t put it into MOTION.  Ever been there?

We are all either (1) looking to premiere our first great idea (2) looking to get our next great idea rolled out or (3) looking to improve our current great idea already on the market.  So how do we accomplish one or all of these things?  How do we set into MOTION that potential entrepreneurial energy which is currently stagnantly waisting away, not making money, not changing lives, not making someone else’s life better, in our revved up minds?  You know you possess the power to change lives, now how do you harness it and put it to use behind a great idea or goal?  Here are some questions and points to ponder in your search (Think, for real!):

1.  If you could be the greatest in the world at one thing what would it be?
   
2. If you had complete freedom of time, how would you use it?  
3. If you had all the resources in the world, what would you build, design or work at?
4. Take your answers from 1-3 and solidify them…write them down!
5. Your answers from 1-3 should reveal something deeper about yourself (your passions for example).  So go ahead and work at what your passionate about, what you really desire to do.  Make real plans to take a step toward making these answers a reality.  
6. Don’t take your life for granted.  Do that which you truly believe is worth doing, don’t make excuses.

There are people around you…everywhere!  They stand beside you in the deli line.  They pump their gas right next to where you stand to pump yours.  They sit in the cubicle right next to yours.  Their facebook picture shows up in line with your other 837 favorite friends.  They run on the treadmill, dripping sweat just like you, less than 2 feet from where you stride.  They eat their meals, many times alone, at the table just adjacent to yours.  They stand shoulder to shoulder with you in the elevator.  They cling to their mothers legs as she,not distracted, continues to shop.  They smile and slightly wave, make eye contact, and quickly move on.  They sit in church every Sunday, filling the pews just like you.  They cling to their newspapers at the coffee shop just like you.  They type away on anything and everything just like you.

Do you ignore them? …or… Do you initiate a conversation with them?

Some people hate to be bothered.  Don’t bother with them.  But, there are so many people out there, in the world all around yours and mine, that long for interaction.  Give it to them.  Interact.  Conversate.  Make a positive connection, no matter how small, and you will change that persons day, maybe even their life.  Don’t forget about those around you.  Make a difference by simply letting others know that you notice them, show them that you care.  Start as many conversations today as you can.  Inspire and be inspired.  How will you ever be able to meet the needs (being a visionary) of those around you if you never talk to them, get to know them and eventually learn those needs.  This will change your life.

I don’t know.  Why should I fill my brain with facts I can find in two minutes in any standard reference book?  -Einstein, in response to the question: how many feet are in a mile?  As taken from the book The Magic of Thinking Big

Maybe you are like me.  Maybe you spent 4 or 5 or even 6 years of your young adult life in a lecture hall, voraciously attempting to scribble down words onto a lined sheet of paper in hopes that later on that week you would be able to interpret what you actually wrote down.  Maybe you are like me, and you asked yourself, “Why am I doing this?”  

What we are taught in school is to push as much information, as many facts as we possibly can, into our overloaded, overworked brains.  We are then taught that those of us who are best able to keep those facts in our brain just long enough to spew them back onto a more formal piece of paper, called an exam, are the most successful of the group (class).  

What is wrong with this picture (or should I say reality)? 

For the majority of students, this way of learning and using our brains continues into the rest of our lives, leaving us with brains that function as mini-warehouse storage units rather than as well polished, active thinking machines.  Remember, (or learn for the first time) it is more important to use your mind to THINK rather than to STORE.  Most anyone with a higher education experience can store, but very few can actually think and process and create and imagine and…well, you are starting to get the picture.  

A fact storing person is only worth as much as the encyclopedia or Internet data base that he memorizes his facts from.  A thinking man or woman is a priceless asset.