10 Steps to Success - Step 8 Clear Energy Leaks

By dougnau on Feb 5, 2008 in Life Coaching, Success

Step 8 Clear Energy Leaks

If you’ve found this article, but have not yet read the introduction 10 Steps to Success, I highly encourage you to do so before continuing. This is part of a series of articles that read in order will give you valuable insight as to how to become successful with anything you envision.

What are Energy Leaks?

At this point in your journey towards realizing your vision and goals you have had the opportunity to evaluate your plan, to take meaningful action, and you may have enrolled appropriate forms of support to bring your dreams into fruition. In the process you are being a success and are well on your way to attaining your goals.

Often when facing the big goals, or when we are just starting to take action towards a new one we are confronted with a challenge of efficiency. We want to move towards our vision but there may be other parts of life that seem to come up time and time again that prevent us from doing so. If they don’t prevent us from moving forward completely, they may really hinder our progress. These roadblocks or items that seem to drain our time and energy are called ‘energy leaks’ and most likely they have nothing to do with our goals at all. These energy leaks take our time and attention away from what we’d really like to focus on.

A concrete example of an energy leak could be a disorganized office space, a set of bills that needs to be done, needing to sign the paperwork for a divorce, the troubled sibling that always requires your attention, or the unpainted portion of the fence that literally sucks the energy out of you each time you drive by it. It is not something that is directly related to the goals you have, but it indirectly affects them simply by their nature.

Energy Leaks, Efficiency, and Dangers

Energy leaks cause a significant reduction in our efficiency; defined as our capacity to quickly and gracefully complete our goals. Since so much of our being is spent acknowledging or directly dealing with the item that is leaking our energy - we are simply drained!

Energy leaks can be dangerous entities. By definition these are the things that we would simply prefer not to have to deal with. If we do not face them directly, with a positive attitude and plan to patch them, they can consume us. We may find ourselves talking about the energy leak, they nag us and drive us N.U.T.S, and the chronic and ongoing energy spent acknowledging the issue wears away at us slowly and continually. Over time the leak consumes an exponential amount of energy that it would have taken simply to close up the leak when it was first identified.

Since action is an energy game (ie: I have only so much energy I can give in a day/week/year/etc), imagine what it would be like if you were able to plug up all of the small leaks in your life, and direct all of your full energy towards your dreams and goals. Now that is success.

Clearing Energy Leaks

Clearing energy leaks can be done with a sense of delight. Delight in the fact that you know that clearing the energy leak will give you the spaciousness and room such that you can put your full attention towards your goals. Begin by following this process:

Make a list of all of the energy leaks that you have. If you are not sure, take a notepad with you for one day and write down all of the things that you notice ‘drain’ you throughout that day. This will identify those that are the biggest part of your life.
Identify which leaks you expend the most energy on. Do you have a plan for clearing it? If not, develop one. What do you notice about the energy it will take to complete the task versus the amount of energy you spend thinking about it over time?
Analyze each item on your list as such. Focus on clearing the biggest energy leaks with the least amount of effort required to complete first. Develop a plan to clear the leaks such that you can optimally function towards attaining your goals.
Some energy leaks are best left for someone else to do! Is it an efficient use of your time to clean the house, to fix the car yourself, or paint your home? By outsourcing the work for energy leaks, we can create an energy surplus by getting more of your money’s worth in value while the contractor also gets more energy (in the form of money) for their work - everyone wins! Where might you best outsource work to create energy instead of drain it?

Spending too much Time on Energy Leaks

Its important to know that we will always have some energy leaks in our life and that we can also err on the side of spending all of our time clearing up the leaks, and even looking for leaks to clear! If you find yourself in that mode, take a look at what it is that you do not want to face.

About a year ago I heard a quote that spoke to me on the radio - unfortunately, I did not have the chance to get the name of the person that spoke it. He said:

“There are actions that make me money; and there are actions that do not”.

Its a black and white type of statement, but I found this to be a very empowering quotation and you can easily imagine that you could replace the word money with any of your personal goals. Fill in the blank. I happened to be thinking about money when I was listening to this interview and I thought to myself that he is talking about being very precise and deliberate about the actions one takes. What is the purpose of your action?

When clearing energy leaks, ask yourself if taking this action is clearing the path towards bringing your vision into fruition. How will it help me attain my goals. If you can draw no connection - the amount of energy the leak is draining may not be enough to focus your attention on.

Accomplishment

When we complete our goals we have an internal sense of accomplishment, joy and satisfaction. When we clear our energy leaks we have a sense of relief, of spaciousness, like a weight has been lifted off of our shoulders.

If you feel as though all of the actions you take are a relief, make sure that you’ve taken the time to enroll a vision such that you are bringing the joy, excitement and fun back into your life. If you are having difficulty doing so, enroll a buddy or a coach to help you get in touch with where your passions lie and how that can be a bigger part of your life. Success is not only measured by what we achieve, but by the life we lead as we are achieving those things.

Be Well