Easter weekend and I am enjoying a quiet weekend at home. It is as if I am waiting to inhale. Within the past couple weeks, I moved from what is called “production” to “distribution” status on my book, Rainbows Over Ruins. As I pressed the start button for the fax machine to send my final approval form to the publisher, my heart skipped a beat.
It has taken time to write and edit. Now, the dream will be a reality. My mind races with questions. Who will I tell about the book? How will I tell them about it? Why will it be of value to others? Thankfully, Balboa Press has a solid marketing staff who are there to help me through the process.
I also just returned from one of Noah St. John’s training sessions in Ohio. It was so much fun to meet with other coaches who are using power habits and afformations with clients. We each came home with an extra added feature – a diagnostic test we can use to evaluate what may be holding our clients back from achieving their ambitions.
Not only that, but on the flight home, I picked up a copy of April’s Spirit Magazine. I rarely read inflight magazines, but the cover story was so compelling. “Van Phillips asked three questions that changed the world. You can ask them too.”
What an incredible coincidence! I was returning from the Ohio training with the man who had introduced me to the power of Afformations, positive questions that can provide breakthrough transformations. They certainly have for me and I now incorporate them into my coaching and writing.
Now, SQuire Rushnell would not call this a coincidence at all. He would call it a God Wink, an unopened gift that has been placed right in front of us, tying the bow so to speak on a package, emphasizing an aspect of our experience. Even knowing about God Winks is a God Wink for Rushnell has appeared on our show a few times, but I have never met him.
Anyway, the article’s author, Warren Berger, is not just covering a news story on Van Phillips’ incredible accomplishments creating the new generation of prosthetic limbs. Nor is he writing about how to make “conversation interesting” as he put it. Berger is talking about “beautiful questions” that have the potential to cause change. After learning about Van Phillips, Berger asked himself “what if we kept asking why and what if?” Berger’s life direction changed. He now participates with the Right Question Institute in Cambridge, Massachusetts to promote more curiosity in school and businesses.
Like Noah St. John, Berger talks about how the answer is in the question. I imagine he felt the same enthusiasm I felt when I first heard about Afformations. For me, it was seeing a connection between what Noah wrote and the Biblical statement: “Ask and it is given.” My mind whirled. What if questions are the answer? What if how we ask is important? What if the Why game was the most important game we could ever play with our children, even if it exhausted us?
Van Phillips is still asking questions. He wants to know why it is possible to provide these state-of-the-art prosthetics to land mine victims in war zones. Berger is suggesting that we ask beautiful questions of ourselves and participate through rightquestion.org and amorebeautifulquestion.com. He’s also written a book, “A More Beautiful Question: The Power of Inquiry to Spark Breakthrough Ideas.” St. John is educating others on the power of positive Why questions at noahstjohn.com. His new book, “The Power of Afformations” even includes a few words of my story in it.
To learn more about how I am incorporating these questions into guiding others on the creative process most effectively, keep watching this blog for news about when Rainbows Over Ruins is available and where you can obtain it.
As new activities ready to kick into gear, that momentary pause between breaths shifts and my mind begins to whirl around a new set of beautiful questions. Have a lovely holiday weekend and ask yourself some beautiful questions.
To Your Success,
Susan