The Art Of The Restart Begins And Ends With A Question

What do you need to restart?

Make time in your hectic life to ponder the restart. A question we all need to be asking ourselves is, “What can I restart that used to be really meaningful to me?

Watch my video or read the transcript below.

C is for “Crux”.

Recently I gave a keynote speech at a school district in upstate New York that got me pondering this question. While I was there, I got to get in a little rock climbing and visit with Skip, my good friend and fellow speaker. After a debrief with Skip on how I could improve my keynote and test drive in his new Tesla, I found a little park with some nice granite rock to climb.

That experience reminded me of how important it is to look back and reflect on things we used to do that really gave us joy. These are the things that filled us with energy or enriched our life in a meaningful way. We should take the time to look back and ask ourselves, “What can we restart that we used to do that was really meaningful or enriching?”

For me, that’s climbing. When I first went full time as a speaker, I was out on the seminar circuit speaking more than 60 hours a month. I was often in the same place for two days in a row and had a little more time for my climbing in the evening.

Now I mostly deliver keynote presentations. I do more than just deliver a speech, every minute I have to spare I try to spend with the client and the people in the meeting room, the awards banquets and in the hallway, trying to support them any way I can. I visit with the other speakers and really entrench myself in the event. After the event, I am eager to get home to the family as quick as possible. So, the consequence of that is I end up not having as much time available to be outside.

When I do a two-day leadership or peak performance workshop, there’s the seminar for the day but then I usually have some time in the evenings completely to myself. Part of my restart strategy is to do more workshops to give people an experience where they can go deeper and internalize my content to drive more results in their life. This also serves my goal to do more climbing with my family, especially before my daughter Lizzy goes off to college.

Once we are empty nesters next year, I hope my wife Emily will travel with me more because I want her with me for every trip. We will see how that dream works out.  And yes, I want to get out and climb every time I can. If there are rocks anywhere nearby, building training on them into my schedule will be essential to nourish what really lights me up so I can serve other more.

Bottom line, my question for you is, “What do you need to restart?”

Please share your response via social media, or you can email me direct if you want to share privately.