Trusting the process

Hello and welcome back. Today's video is part four of trusting as part of the TRUE Leaders Programme. So far we thought about what trust is. We have thought about trusting ourselves and we have thought about trusting others. Today is a big topic. It is about trusting the process. This is something that I am incredibly passionate about. I mean, I am incredibly passionate because it is something that I feel a little bit uncomfortable about or I certainly did for a long time. My natural default is that I like to organize things. I like to plan things. I like to be in control of things. That is not always possible. What I am have been learning to do over the last few years is to embrace the fact that that is not possible and that is actually a good thing, and that by trusting the process, it releases a lot of pressure for me. It means that I can enjoy things a lot more and it also means that I am putting my trust in something that I do not know which is really, really tough for me, I am going to be honest, but the benefits are huge. This for me speaks a lot about intuition and it is about feeling from the heart and not necessarily coming from the head. I spend a lot of my time thinking about things, trusting the process, and to be honest- a lot of the elements of trust. But particularly for me, trust in the process. You may be different in that, there is no right or wrong. But for me, trusting the process feels like a leap of faith. I spoke about belief and faith and how trusting was about that for me. It is a huge leap of faith for me to trust the process.

What is the process? So I am going to talk a little bit more about my experiences in today's video. I will give you a little bit of an insight into that and encourage you to think about what that means for you.

So I would like to share a metaphor around this which sometimes can be helpful for helping us think about things that are not as concrete. This definitely applies here. So you may have heard them. It is based on a parable actually. So it is based on a story about trusting something outside of yourself, whether you believe in God or not, whatever that might be. For me, it is the wider universe. But for you, it may be something different. But the parable is about cycling of all things. It is about the fact that when you are cycling, so you have got a tandem and you are at the front of the tandem. There is someone behind you and they are not pedalling. So you are really going for it, really taking steps to go forwards that you are gaining momentum and you are in control of your forward movements. You decide where you go, you are steering, you are pushing for it. Everything is going really well. But it is all down to you. It is all in your control.

What can then happen is you might let somebody else who is sitting on the back of the tandem join you in helping, and maybe guiding, and helping you to move forward. It leaves a little bit of that pressure. What might then happen is over time. You may gain a lot more trust in this movement of wherever is the journey. The journey of life is how I like to think of this. As you gain trust, then you are able to take a bit more of a backseat, and somebody else is in front. Now, that is not a person. It is not putting your trust solely and somebody else to control your life.

What it is doing is recognising that when you let something else take the lead when you just trust the process and you just relax a little bit more, you sit at the back, you are able to see so much more. You are able to still be part of an active part of driving forward by pedalling away. But you are not constantly having to think about where you are going because something else is doing that for you, and you are able to take in the sights, appreciate them more, and just be guided by whatever feels natural. I love that. It scares me if I am honest but I also love it, and I like to think about this. When things feel a little bit out of control, or maybe when I do not know what the right path for me is. Again,
we are using these analogies about a journey. So when I do not know that I am able to just trust that the right path in my life will happen somehow, and I might behave in a certain way that makes sure that I am aligning with how I live my life, but I am not as active in making things happen. I am just trusting that things will happen. This all sounds very "woo woo" I would kind of refer to it as, and that may not speak to you, and that is totally cool.

But the way I kind of then apply that into life is I start to think about specific examples where I have let go of an outcome. If I am too attached to a certain outcome, then when that does not happen, if that does not happen, I am not going to be as comfortable with it. When I am not attached to an outcome, it can be a win-win situation, because whatever happens, I can enjoy the journey and I can enjoy the process. So part of trusting the process is letting go of a specific outcome. For me, this is about having a guiding principle rather than a very specific path to get in somewhere. There are certain times where we need that specificity to help us get somewhere, and there are times when we do not. So trust in the process.

We always work if you have a very specific short-term goal, then just relaxing and seeing what happens is not likely to be the right way to go about things. But trusting the process is more applicable to me, anyway. When I am not sure exactly how I am going to do something, but I know it is the right thing to start to do and I am open-minded and much more willing to try different things. So that is what trusting the process is about to me.

For today, what I would love you to do is to think a little bit about, can you think of examples when you have trusted something. It may be, this often happens in project work, when there are so many variables because there are so many other people involved. That might be in your working life, it could be in your home life. You should think about redecorating. Or if you ever had any major renovation work in your home or anything that you are not really as able to be specifically in control of trusting the process can be incredibly powerful.

So I would like you to think about when you have been able to trust the process, and what the benefits have been. Today's stretch is about which area of your life or what part of your life, and it could be a specific thing or it could be a certain area like your work life or your relationship with your family or your relationship with a significant other, or whatever that might be, is where could you let go of some of that personal control and learn to trust the process a little bit more, and what that method might have benefits be to you of trusting the process.

So it is slightly less concrete today. But I hope you find it helpful for me to be a little bit more vulnerable and share some of the things that I found really challenging. But what I found is that those are things that taking me to the edge of my stretch zone and really into my learning zone. These are the things that have been most powerful for me. There may be other parts of the programme that hit that spot for you, but for me, this is one of the ones that has been incredibly powerful.

So I would love to hear your thoughts about trusting the process and how it works for you. That is what today's reflection piece is around. That is one of the key areas of trusting for me.

So that is part four. Part five is a culmination of bringing everything together. But for now, just focus on trusting the process. Maybe you can apply this to theme as well. Are you the sort of person always like to know what is going to be happening, or can you just trust the process? So that is what I would like to think about today. Thank you ever so much. Enjoy trusting the process and I will see you soon.