The Vuja de Moment: Create a different future

Simon T. Bailey

Founder, The Brilliance Institute Author, Catalyst of Brilliance Keynote Speaker, 2012 APWA Congress

Editor’s Note: Simon T. Bailey will be a Keynote Speaker at APWA’s 2012 International Public Works Congress & Exposition in Anaheim, California. His presentation is entitled “Release Your Brilliance – How to Show Up, Be Accountable, and Drive Results” and takes place during the Closing General Session on Wednesday, August 29. For more information on our upcoming Congress, please visit our website at www.apwa.net/congress.

A 52-year-old man called in to a radio show and said to the host, “I am out of a job and you know that no man at 52 years of age can get a job. Furthermore, I don’t have any brains. I haven’t had any good experiences in life. I haven’t had any education and nobody likes me. What are you going to tell me to do about it?”

Dr. Norman Vincent Peale, the host of the show, asked, “How do you know you don’t have any brains?” The man said, “When I was young I was told I didn’t have any brains. All of the brains in the family went to my brother!” Dr. Peale then asked, “Who said that to you?” The man said, “My brother.” Dr. Peale then asked, “Who doesn’t like you?” The man said, “No one likes me.” Dr. Peale asked, “Do you like yourself?” The man then said, “I never thought I was supposed to like myself since I didn’t have any brains.” This sounds like a combination of the Scarecrow, the Tin Man, and the Cowardly Lion from The Wizard of Oz.

Six weeks later the 52-year-old man sent a note to Dr. Peale stating that he had a job. It wasn’t much of a job, but he believed that he would take what he had been given and turn it into something significant. He said that he was going to work it until it became great.

This 52-year-old experienced what I would call the Vuja de Moment. This is when you find and delete the virus from your mind-drive and heart-drive that has slowed your operating system down in the Matrix.

The Vuja de Moment is when you stop whining and complaining about the economy and decide to grow the economy of your mind. It is when you reset your internal thermostat to being brilliant and watch your life rise to the new temperature.

William James (1842-1910), onetime Harvard Professor of Anatomy, Psychology, and Philosophy, who was a contemporary of Mark Twain and Horatio Alger, Jr., taught the “as if” principle. This school of thought meant to not be afraid of life. Believe that life is worth living and your belief will help create the fact; and, if you want a quality life, act as if you already have it.

The Vuja de Moment is when you act “as if” you can create your future instead of waiting for the other shoe to drop and have it created for you. Like the 52-year-old man, something clicks inside of you and you say, “Wait a minute, I have a choice to stand up and live or lie down and die.” Some people are the walking dead. The recession has sucked the life out of them and they have settled for whatever life brings them. A recession happens when people lose confidence in the future. Many have called the last few years the worst recession since the Great Depression. Simply put, the economy shrank in five quarters, including four quarters in a row. This means that not even the Jaws of Life could pry open the wallets of consumers to spend or employers to hire. Research was limited and capital investment decreased. Thus, people began to buy into the meme (an element of a culture or behavior that may be passed from one individual to another by non-genetic means, especially imitation) that the future is bleak.

However, a Vuja de Moment occurred when Apple released the first iPad in 2010 and sold three million in 80 days. This is similar to when www. pinterest.com launched in 2010, and has become one of the top ten most visited social network sites with over 11 million total visits per week according to www.hitwise.com.

What’s the point?

Everything shifted for the 52-year-old man when he decided he didn’t have to live out the script of his brother anymore. Apple and Pinterest ignored conventional wisdom and read the tea leaves of the times differently and decided to create the future. What about you? Isn’t it time to take control of the steering wheel of your future and drive instead of being driven by the memes of the times? How can one do it?

See Differently – Alexander Graham Bell said, “When one door closes,

another opens. But we often look so regretfully upon the closed door that we don’t see the one which has opened for us.” What do you see as it relates to your future? It’s time to ask a different set of questions.

Harness the Power of You, Inc. – Larry Boyer, Career Coach and Personal Branding Strategist, says to think of yourself as an independent contractor or consultant and your employer is your biggest client. This is a significant shift, more than most people realize. You need to undo a lifetime of training and expectations setting. When you make this mind shift, you start to own your actions, words and attitudes in a way that you haven’t before. The economy is shifting. You know it and I know it. Let’s prepare for it.

Ignite a Fresh Vision – Rosabeth Moss Kanter says, “A vision is not a picture of what could be; it is an appeal to our better selves, a call to become something more.” I love this quote. What are you planning to do to soar to the next level in your professional and personal life? It’s your decision.

Fuel Your Mind – Dr. Howard Gardner, author of The Five Minds for the Future, says, “The world of the future—with its ubiquitous search engines, robots, and other computational devices—will demand capacities that until now have been mere options. To meet the new world on its own terms, we should begin to cultivate these capacities now.” The capacities that he speaks of include growing the mind.

Take Control of the Wheel

– Robert Kiyosaki, author of The Business of the 21st Century, says, “Take responsibility for your finances—or get used to taking orders for the rest of your life. You’re either a master of money or a slave to it. Your choice. Taking control of the wheel is steering your future in the direction you want to go instead of always reacting to every whim of change and disruption.”

I believe that you will have your very own “Vuja de Moment” and will say, “Wait a minute— something has to change and it starts with me.” This will be the time when you turn your “moment” in your life into your “movement” in your life.

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Simon T. Bailey is a compelling instigator and new author of The Vuja de Moment – Shift from Average to Brilliant. Find out more at www.simontbailey.com and follow him on Twitter @simontbailey.