By: Susan Mazza
If you want to be adaptable you must be willing to let go of the need to know the answer.
Why? Because there is rarely one answer: that single right answer to the questions you are being asked and are asking or the right path through the challenges you face.
Sure there are questions for which there is a known answer. For example, what is the sum of 2 + 2? There are also those answers you can find in a book. For example, if you take a test on American History in the US in school the right answers can be found in the book you were assigned.
Yet if you took an American History class in another country they might use an entirely different book and some of the answers might not be the same. And let’s not forget that for a very long time the answer to the question, “Is the world flat?” was a definitive, “Yes.”
The problem with needing to know “the” answer is the questions we are asking today are more often than not about an unknown future rather than a known past. The book is essentially not yet written.
So you have two choices: wait for the book or become the author.
The thing is, you are already the author of your life, your career, your relationships, your business. Essentially you are the author of your past, present and future. Whether you accept that or not is another matter entirely.
If you truly want to be adaptable you must first accept your role as author.
Until you do you may find yourself equipped for a world that no longer exists while you wait for someone to write the book with the answers.
Your choice. Unless, of course, you know someone with a crystal ball.
What do you think it takes to be adaptable?
Post originally appeared on: Random Acts of Leadership
A catalyst for conversations that matter, relationships that work and results that inspire, Susan Mazza serves leaders and their organizations as a Leadership Coach, Change Agent and Motivational Speaker.
One of the founding Members of The Lead Change Group, a non-profit, global leadership community, Susan also Co-authored The Character-Based Leader: Instigating a Revolution of Leadership One Person at a Time.
