Action. Isn’t that a great command? It really is too bad that we think of actors as people will play-act or who pretend to act, as opposed to an older meaning of the word, to act upon. One who acts, who takes action, acts upon something. It should be the highest praise we have to call someone an actor. That would mean you have one who not only yap, yap, yaps, talk, talk, talks, but one who takes action.
Epiphanies are for action. Specifically they’re for new action. Stick with the movie metaphor a step further. It’s the director who yells out “Action!” giving the command to commence the scene and the actors are, of course, the ones who obey the command. We must be both parties. That, in fact, is the real purpose of your daily recruiting journal. In it, you want to write up the script for your action thriller, and it is there that you come to terms with the scene and the props and the lighting and camera angles, etc., in order to create your great work of art. This is exactly what your daily recruiting journal is for. It is there that you must contend with all the obstacles preventing the fulfillment of your recruiting dream. And it is there that you must awaken the movie director within yourself who will yell “Action!” at the part of you who is the movie star.
My own inner movie director yelled at me to stop taking insulin. I promise you, the actor in me did nothing other than freeze, at first. When I started taking insulin, I honestly thought I’d be taking it for the rest of my life. Being me, I instantly started picturing the insulin firms hiring me to consult with them. I pictured myself becoming the poster boy of honest, righteous, fanatically disciplined use of this life saving drug. As I said before, I was very grateful to the insulin I injected. It felt like the gift of life itself.
More, I did study about the history of insulin and the fact that we have these pen needles today, perfect measurements, complete ease of use, brilliant design; man, when you compare that to the self-torture people had to inflict just a couple of short decades ago, it is very easy to love the insulin manufacturing companies!
But, the epiphany that I shared yesterday, about the insulin-induced lows and most of all, the fact that I was eating more and more carbohydrates – essentially sugar – in order to offset these lows, it would not leave me alone. So, June 23 – it was a Thursday – I hit a low of 57 in my blood sugar at 11:10 am. The epiphany struck again and with great fear and trembling – I am not exaggerating – I decided to eat lunch without taking an insulin shot.
A couple of previous details come to bear, here. First, you need to know that through my careful use of the insulin and the copious blood sugar readings I’d been taking (more on that another time) I’d already gone through three reductions in my dosage in just four weeks. But, for all that, I was still taking pills twice a day and five separate injections of insulin. Insulin comes in short acting – you take it before you eat – and long acting – it regulates your blood sugar through the night, etc. So I was taking two long term doses, morning and evening, and three short term doses, one with each meal.
Even just four weeks of that is plenty enough to set up habits. More than that, though, there is an instant lifelong dependency that you set in your mind and heart. So, I do emphasize, eating that first meal without shooting up first, Thursday, June 23, was an absolutely terrifying, yet exhilarating experience. That was the first action my epiphany demanded.
I’ll be off next week, so when I return November 7, I’ll share a bit more about how my epiphany indicated transforming action. Have a great week until then, and go find your own action indicating epiphanies!
[originally posted October 27, 2011 at my LinkedIn Discussion Group]
One Comment
ACTION. I’m good with that. Focused, simple, laser-like action. “Epiphanies are for action”. It is so true. I am creating my own movie. I’m a player on the grand stage with 8 billion other actors, a few thousand of which will be in my scenes. I would say that with all due respects the universe is my producer and my higher power, my co-director. We are a team. The more in touch I am with the producer, the more familiar I am with the stage, the more I’m in touch with my co-director, my very soul, the more my actions will be real and focused. My meditations, I just epiphanized, must be long and deep enough to access the co-directors feelings, to clear the slate for the next scene, to clense my mind of the garbage/obstacles to the work ahead. I feel a sense of peace just writing this. Now to my daily plan.
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