Creating Defining Moments In Your Business - Gordon Hester

"Aha!!" You know those moments that stop you in your tracks ... those moments when the light switches on and you are hit with a sudden sense of clarity about something big?

These are known as Major Moments, Breakthroughs, Epiphanies, or Defining Moments, and they often have a profound impact on both our thinking and our activity.

We can create these moments in our businesses. Some excellent information below from our great friend and business momentum specialist Gordon Hester with five simple strategies to increase the probability of creating defining moments in your business.

In 1964, world renowned Psychologist Abraham Maslow coined the term “peak experiences” as a sudden feeling of intense well-being that fill us with wonderment and awe. Over the years, there have been other terms to explain this phenomenon such as Major Moments, Breakthroughs, Epiphanies or Aha Moments. Regardless of the terminology, psychologists seem to agree that healthy people tend to have more and more of them and such experiences can bring feelings of interconnectedness and create a sharper sense of life purpose. I tend to call these experiences “Defining Moments” because I think they bring clarity to critical thinking areas of your life and have a profound impact on both thinking and activity. Often what fuels these moments is a sudden moment of clarity in thinking during a period of high emotion. Examples of such times would include special moments, being recognized for something, accomplishing a tough goal, breakups, deep addictions, a death, or the loss of a job.

As I have noted in other blogs, emotions tied to new thinking has a higher level of impact on our brain (and decision making) because emotion is a door to our subconscious. When you have a defining moment it feels like the brain turns on a switch that completely overturns your value system and core beliefs. Neuroscience studies on this phenomenon show that defining moments cause a pattern in the brain. Seconds before you become aware of a defining moment, you reduce visual activity and turn off all unrelated thinking. In essence, people experience an acute awareness about something to which they were previously blind. It is these experiences that allow us to see beyond our own behavioral limits.

It is important to clarify that not all defining moments are the same. For some people, climbing to the peak of Mount Everest is their defining doment. For a shy person, reaching out to a stranger is the equivalent of climbing Mount Everest. Notice that in either example, there is great pleasure or pain associated with the defining moment. This is important to understand because if we are looking to create these moments, we have to determine what has a major impact on both pain and pleasure in the individual. As noted by Shane Lopez, scientist for the Gallup organization “often our defining moments are those that match our hopes and dreams, that is because anticipation plays a critical role. In the end, it is these defining moments that often help us create the key stories (or narratives) that solidify both the memories and directions of our lives.

As a “business integration expert”, I was left with an important question – can we create defining moments in our businesses? The answer is “yes”. Below are 5 simple strategies that you can use to increase the probability of creating defining moments in your business.

1. Set Challenging Goals – as one of my mentors used to say, the most important part of a goal is what you have to become to achieve it. People often have defining moments in pursuit of goals. For so many, periods of struggle to overcome challenges are often where people grow the most, experience defining moments, and find the most happiness. Increasing one’s capacity is a path that requires you to challenge both thinking and action.
2. Be Part of a Business Culture that is Making a Difference – Whether you are part of a business culture or you create one, often defining moments are created when you are part of a community that is making the world a better place. When business cultures are driven by a cause, you experience a wave of constant reminders about one of the key lessons in life – that contribution defines all our lives. You never know when someone will realize this lesson, so being part of a business culture defined by contribution means you will get repeated exposure to a type of thinking that can transform your life. 
3. Buy Experiences, Not Things – Material items are about the moment. Experiences are about a lifetime. Learn to cultivate more experiences in your spending. It is often these experiences that create defining moments. They bring clarity to thought. They become the stories that we will tell our entire lifetime. If you took every day of your life and looked to define it solely by magical experiences, your life would be greater than you ever imagined possible.
4. Dream Again – To cultivate defining moments, you have to have a love affair with the future. Dreaming about the future is a powerful way to create energy, discipline and results. The key is to schedule quiet time to think and practice dreaming. Years ago I made “self communication time” (quiet time to process life) part of my every day routine. Out of every change and strategy I have utilized over the years to improve time management, taking self communication time produced the greatest results.
5. Journal Experiences – As the old adage goes, you have to inspect what you expect. Each day you should write down the experiences of the day and examine how to elevate them. Remember, not all experiences are the same. Below is a breakdown I received at a Tony Robbins event that might explain the difference. The goal is to enhance the level of our experiences toward a Class 1 experience as much as possible.

Remember, business is a “needs vehicle”. It can be a way to achieve all of your six human needs – certainty, uncertainty, significance, love and connection, growth, and contribution. One of the ways to enhance the fulfillment of all of your needs is to implement strategies that can produce a higher level of thinking in you. Defining moments are those moments that become a profound part of our life story. Since business is such a large part of all our lives, why not learn to utilize it to create more defining moments in your life?

The choice is yours.