Zen (Slacker) Prospecting

by Bear Jack Gebhardt on April 3, 2010

           Was recently talking with an old friend — an independent painter/handyman—about how to generate new biz.

gotta work this out...

            “When I know I need to generate more business, I come up with a few ideas about who might want to hire me,” he said. “So I send out some feelers, make some contacts, and sure enough, I seem to get new business. Curiously, though, it’s usually not from the people I was contacting. Sometimes it is, but quite often the new business comes from some unexpected source. But I’ve learned over the years that I can’t just wait for the unexpected new business. I have to make the effort. “

            I noticed the same phenomenon when I was a stockbroker, prospecting for new clients. Sometimes new clients came from the list of people to whom I was reaching out, but often they came in the side door, from unexpected sources. Again, though, I couldn’t just wait for the unexpected business. I had to make the effort.

            Why does it work this way?

            Something to do with our inner doors. Making an effort on the outside—doing the calling, or the mailing, or the door knocking — opens up doors on the inside, let’s the universe know we are ready, willing, available. And fortunately, the universe is not bound by our particular doors. It can answer by opening doors we didn’t even know were there. By our efforts—knocking— we are letting the universe know we are available. It takes over from there, opens up whatever door seems right. .

            We can’t fake it though. We do have to honestly believe that there is at least a possibility for new business to come from our efforts. (Possibility thinking?)  We can’t knock on doors while thinking, “This never works.” The universe will also generously answer that door, and prove us right.

            (Fortunately, the universe is more willing to share its abundance with us than we are to accept it. So sometimes, even when we’re thinking, “This never works,” the universe plays a happy joke on us and shows us it does work!)

            Some people have the good fortune— or inner discipline—to be always working with inner doors wide open. These are the folks about whom others say, “She has the Midas touch. Everything she touches turns to gold.”

            Most of us were not raised up in such a way that our inner doors remain wide open, especially the inner doors to prosperity.  Au contraire.  For many of us, the inner doors were not only shut, but nailed and barred.

            So most of us have to consciously work to open the inner doors, and keep them open. Paradoxically, the way to open the inner doors, and keep them open, is to inwardly ease up, inwardly relax, allow ourselves to simply be at ease with the day, the hour, the moment’s activity.

            Outwardly, to get more business, or to get a job, or to find our niche we still need to engage in good old fashioned prospecting. We need to consistently reach out, make new contacts, send more letters, make the phone calls, answer the ads, knock on the doors. 

             Yet inwardly, we need to nourish our ease. Inwardly, we can allow ourselves to be secret slackers, not sweating the small stuff. (And as the book reminds us, it’s all small stuff?)

            What does this look like—to prospect with ease? It means we need not be overly concerned about the outcome of our prospecting. Sure, we make the phone calls, send the letters, knock on the doors, yet we are quite aware that prosperity does not depend on the outcome of these actions. We observe and are mindful that we are small potatoes in the overall picture. The universe itself is the one actually taking care of its own business, and we see that we are the business of the universe.

            Outward action and inward ease (See “Basic Exercises” on this page) is the Zen approach to prospecting. It’s this combination that opens the doors!

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