Risk & Business Magazine Lovitt & Touché Fall 2015 | Page 18

One of the other learnings would be to find the best person
literally in the world that has done what you want to do before
or something close to it and talk to them about whether they
would want to be a guide to you in doing it again or whether
they would give you advice and counsel. Getting the very best
people in the world together on a team to help and support
you and then making sure you’re resourced properly and you’re
not under-resourced to undertake a large initiative or goal.
Can you explain the concept of celebrating your “death day”?
All of us have a birthday. There is another day we all are
going to pass during this coming year, and that is the
day that you’re going to pass on. We’ve already had our
birthday. The question is: what day will we pass on?

a lot of planning and breaking them down. But if you
set your mind to it, most things can be achieved.
What are the parallels between planning and
climbing mountains, and being an entrepreneur
and trying to run your own business?
First of all, let’s start with setting stretch goals. In business
planning, people often refer to them as Big Hairy Audacious
Goals. Setting an inspiring stretch objective with the buyin from your whole team together is a parallel. Setting
goals like mountains that you might want to summit or
large business goals you want to achieve would parallel.
The second would be in preparing. You have to take a step back
and understand: how can I become prepared? How can I train
for it? How can we develop the skill sets or resources required
in order to achieve this big goal and how do we put a team
together than can accomplish that and make that happen?

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RISK & BUSINESS MAGAZINETM FALL 2015

The suggestion is the life planning process. Some really like
it and many of us don’t like it because our subconscious
doesn’t want us to recognize what the Buddhists talk
about a lot, which is that one day we’re going to pass on.
Every single year we get closer to that day that we’re going
to pass on and we’re not going to be here anymore. It’s so
obvious, but most of us don’t spend time thinking about it.
This life planning process suggests choosing a day in
the year when you’re going to pass on. Yes, you have a
birthday to celebrate every year, but what day in the year
will you choose to pass on and in what year will that be?
Then every year when you get closer to it, you have one
less year to live. You’re one year closer to the day you’re
going to pass on, which makes the really inspiring things
that most of us put off to the side really prominent in
importance because you have less time to accomplish
those things that are really inspiring to you in your life.
It can lead you to prioritize your dreams and prioritize the
things that really give you energy in your life. Maybe move
some things out of your life that are taking away from
your life like negative situations, relationships, or other
energy detractors in your life such that you will, in the
next year, celebrate a great year that you’ll never live again
as you’re one year closer to the year you’re passing on.