Allyson Lewis - The 7 Minute Difference: Small Steps to Big Changes

SMALL STEPS TO BIG CHANGES

THE

MINUTE DIFFERENCE

Allyson Lewis

Dedication

To
Mark, Abby, and J. Mark
Ann and Al
Al III
Kes and Sam
Gloria and Jim
and
Jill
... my family.

Contents

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A few years ago, during an annual team-building meeting at the brokerage firm where I work as a financial advisor, my team participated in an exercise in which we took a blank sheet of paper from a yellow legal pad and wrote five words at the top of the page. Those five words were, My purpose in life is... with a 15-minute time limit, we were to write down the description to complete that thought.

As the clock began ticking, my mind drifted lazily through a variety of dreams and goals Id aspired to over the years; then, my thoughts wandered back to the present, and the work I had waiting for me back in my office. By the time I snapped my attention back to the task, a glance at the timer told me that I had daydreamed through 8 of the 15 minutes. Then, as if out of nowhere, the words came to me. I wrote:

My purpose in life is GROWING. In life, I want to grow and change. I want to be different tomorrow than I am today. I want to grow as a wifeto be more in love with my husband, to hold hands more often, to enjoy long talks late into the night, and to share our hopes and dreams. I want to grow as a motherto watch my children mature into their own destinies. I want to grow as a spiritual personto become kinder, wiser, more hopeful, and more understanding. I want to grow my skills as a financial advisor and help my clients grow their assets. I want to work at my job with joy and honesty and integrity. I want each day to be filled with fun and excitement and challenge. And, I want to help others bring about meaningful changes in their own lives, by sharing my discoveries and ideas. My purpose in life is fulfilled by growing and through helping others grow.

The timer went off and I looked up at my team members feeling slightly stunned. The preceding seven minutes had encapsulated a defining moment of my life. The 7 MinuteDifferenceSmall Steps to Big Changes is a product of that defining moment.

Understanding the 7 Minute Differenceand Micro-Actions

At the time I just described, I had spent 21 years of my life working in my vocation; I came to work every day and did a good job. But something was missing. I wanted moremore hope, more joy, more fun, and more fulfillment. I wanted to be more. I wanted to help others find hope, joy, laughter, purpose, and passion in their own lives. In just seven minutes, a simple exercise had helped me reach a whole new understanding of who I was and what I wanted to be. Working with just a kitchen timer, a legal pad, and an ink pen, I had given shape to an idea of my purpose, and that idea would help determine and guide the actions that have defined my life from that day on. Over the next several days I kept thinking about the power of those seven minutes. I realized that there were hundreds of things I could accomplish in seven minutestiny little opportunities to make my life and the lives of those around me better. I began to look at life through the lens of the 7 Minute Difference. The ripples of that idea are still widening, as I continue to grow in my purpose and passion for life through an ongoing series of small changes.

The subtitle to this book is Small Steps to Big Changes. I believe that small steps truly can bring about the biggest changes in our lives. The best part of all is that change happens in an instantthe moment you decide that, you truly want to be different. That is at the heart of my message. Change, in fact, is the essence of all lifewithout change, we die. Of course, most of us would like to make positive changes that represent growth and development, rather than decay. The problem is that we are uncertain of what the nature of those changes should be and what concrete steps we can take to achieve them. Too often, we think of change as being complex, unmanageable, and beyond our grasp. When we think that way, we ignore the fact that the biggest, most meaningful, and dramatic differences in our livesand in our worldare really just the result of a series of small, seemingly insignificant changes. When changes are guided by our idea of purpose, they can build, over time, toward meaningful growth and development.

That understanding formed the basis of the first 7 Minute Idea Id like to share with you:

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I believe that making even small changes in youractions and behavior can result in monumentaldifferences in your life.

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In this book, I call the activities that result in these small changes micro-actions. Micro-actions are so simple they are often overlooked and underutilized. They are the tiny choices corporate executives and salespeople use every moment of every day to make the difference between mediocrity and excellence. In my experience, the micro-action of writing down a short description of purpose resulted in a major change in my personal and professional life, but micro-actions can take any number of forms, including:

Outlining a daily plan of action

Taking time to thank a co-worker for a job well done

Building time into the day to catch up between meetings

Being on time or early for every meeting

Handwriting thank-you notes to two customers a day

Reading ten pages of a book

Getting up 15 minutes earlier

Eating more fruit and drinking more water

When incorporated into a daily routine, these micro-actions take on even greater potential for bringing about immense new levels of productivity and growth in our work and home life. Although individual micro-actions might take 5 minutes, 7 minutes, 10 minutes, 15 minutes, or more, all of them are inspired by what I call 7 Minute Ideasideas founded in our purpose and passion that help us plan and carry out concrete steps toward the goal of making an important difference in our lives.

Why seven minutes? Studies have shown that the average corporate executive has an attention span of seven minutes. Further, according to Harvard psychologist George Miller, the brain is limited to remembering only seven pieces of information at a time. I know that my own attention can wander easily, so I wanted to create processes and systems for working through the day that were short and easy to implement. 7 Minute Ideas and the micro-actions that support them are my tools for maximizing my ability to succeed.

7 Minute Ideas are not just limited to identifying micro-actions that contribute to professional growth. I use these tools to grow personally, as well. For example, in around seven minutes I can

outline and prioritize my top personal goals;

write a description of where I want my life to be in five years;

write a love letter to my spouse;

call my parents;

talk to my children about their day; or

take a moment to relax and breathe.

Just seven minutes. What could you accomplish in seven minutes? I encourage you to begin to look at life through the possibilities of the 7 Minute Difference, and realize that in a very short period of time, you can use micro-actions to bring about monumental growth in your personal and professional life.

Why I Wrote The 7 Minute Difference

As a financial advisor, I work with a major New York brokerage firm. I have been in the same career since 1982, and with the same company since 1984. I loved my job since the first day.

Yet, as you can imagine, the past five years have been a challenge for all of us in the financial services industry. After almost two decades of spectacular growth in the stock market, between 2000 and 2002 we faced unprecedented events: the bursting of the technology bubble that resulted in a NASDAQ drop of 78 percent; the September 11 terrorist attacks; and the corporate scandals surrounding Enron, WorldCom, and Adelphia, which accompanied a 48 percent decline in the S&P 500 Index. As 2002 came to a close and 2003 dawned, I knew it was time for a change. A wise man once told me,