I would like to present a little exercise for you. Grab yourself a piece of paper along with a pen or a sharpie. Now draw nine dots on your piece of paper, just like I have below. When you complete this process, what I’d like you to do is take your pen or marker and connect all these nine dots using four lines only, without taking your pen off the paper.
Take a minute to complete that exercise. If you have not done this exercise before what happens is you begin to look at these and begin to get a little perplexed. I assume you’re having a difficult time completing this exercise. Again, four lines only, without taking your pen off the paper, connect all the dots.
What happens is when you look at this exercise, you see these nine dots in the form of a square or a box. What happens then is you start thinking inside the box and you can’t really get your head around how to accomplish this. Any time in life or business, if you want to accomplish more, if you want to be more, if you want to have more, you have to think outside the box.
This is a great little exercise for salespeople to do with the person you’re sitting with before you get to your presentation. Why? Because it gets your prospect thinking about the possibilities. It rids them of all their preconceived notions.
Now, what’s the best way of thinking outside the box? First of all, if you’re attempting to do it yourself, it’s very difficult, because it’s just you. It’s just your brainpower alone.
What I always recommend is the use of a mastermind group. Masterminding is a strategy where two or more people are in harmony in the same conversation directed towards the same outcome. That’s when you reach infinite intelligence. The universe of infinite intelligence is where all the ah ha’s are, where all the, “Oh my God, where did that come?”, blind flash to the obvious, that makes so much sense, appear. And infinite intelligence can only be tapped into when you are two or more people in harmony in the same conversation directed towards the same outcome. This is exactly why coaching is so effective at producing results.
When you’re having a deep conversation with somebody where you’re really brainstorming to an outcome or solution, all of a sudden, it’s like, “Whoa, where’d that come from?” The answer just appears. That answer comes from the universe of infinite intelligence. I strongly urge you, if you begin to get stuck inside the box, sit down with somebody and mastermind. Pool your brain energies to tap into that universe of knowledge.
The nine dots are a great little exercise. The next time you get stuck, the next time you’re perplexed, the next time you’re really searching for the answer, either take a long walk, let the answers slowly come to you. However, most importantly, and most effectively, use the mastermind principle to brainstorm with others reach into that invisible universe called infinite intelligence, tap into that knowledge and use it to take yourself and your business to a whole new level of break-throughs.