The Hands-Off Manager by Steve Chandler Read Free Book Online

and encountered his litany of stressful thoughts about the future. Kyle thought they were legitimate concerns about the present.
    “The list is endless,” he said. “I’ve got so much to do today that I sometimes feel like jumping out of this window.”
    “That’s one option,” I said. “As long as you don’t do it while I’m sitting here. That would be my request of you. As your coach.”
    “Well, what would you do?”
    “I’d go on vacation.”
    Kyle laughed bitterly. That was the last thing he could possibly do with all these crises coming up.
    I said, “Kyle, will you do an exercise with me right now? I think it might help us sort this out.”
    “Sure. Whatever.”
    “Close your eyes and let your mind travel back in time to the last time you felt happy when you got out of bed. When was the last time you felt total peace inside, and started your day in a fully relaxed and happy way?”
    Kyle took a while. Finally he said, with his eyes still closed, “My trip to Mazatlan. I remember waking up each morning with nothing to do. We didn’t plan much on that trip. We just woke up whenever we wanted and walked to the patio and looked out over the water. It was like being in heaven.”
    “And so you did nothing?”
    “Oh no! We did a lot of fun things. Our days were full. But it was funny that there was no stress. No real need to be anywhere. We just did whatever came to us.”
    “So you did a lot.”
    “Quite a lot and it was all fun.”
    “Did you have lists of what to do?”
    “No. We had ideas, even before we went there. But we just did things as they occurred to us. One thing at a time.”
    “And so I think you’ve hit on it, Kyle.”
    “What? Move to Mazatlan?”
    “In a way.”
    “What do you mean?”
    “You said it. You gave yourself the answer.”
    “What did I say?”
    “You said you did one thing at a time.”
    Using Focus and Intention
    Kyle thought for a moment. Then he said, “Well that’s not possible around here.”
    “Really? What were you doing before I came in?”
    “I was finishing up the Bertoia Report. In fact, I sent it off as an attachment as you were walking in.”
    “So that was the one thing you were doing?”
    “Well, yeah.”
    “Try to see that all your life you have only done one thing at a time. It’s all you ever have to do. It’s all you’ve ever done. It’s always worked for you. It always will. You just don’t trust it, so your mind races into the future and you try to do 100 things—in your mind—all at once, and that’s what causes you stress.”
    Kyle and I talked for a long time about the impossibility of doing more than you can handle. That coaching session was the first in a series that moved Kyle away from his worried to-do list of 100 action items he was staring at all day. He soon learned to take his hands off that massive to-do list completely and keep it in a drawer. Kyle soon adopted his Mazatlan lifestyle of “one thing at a time.” That’s all he would ever do, and all he would ever have to do. He learned to live at work just as he did in Mazatlan, doing one happy, relaxed thing at a time, and learning, to his surprise, that it would always be more than enough to bring him success. Kyle learned to live in the present moment.
    You can see how old-school managers such as Kyle are so painfully attached to all these things they have to do all day (which are, in reality, nothing but thoughts).
    Managers similar to Kyle would look at the list of 100 and be repelled by very the sight of it! They’d shrink away in fear. So they would do something else. Something not even on their list! Out of fear of not being busy.
    What could these struggling managers be focused on instead of that grim list? They could be focused on their intention to make progress in the present moment. The present moment is the only place where one’s life can be moved forward.That’s where all creativity occurs, when it occurs.
    True power—the real measure of