Written by: Paul Corke, Executive Contributor
Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.
“When you arise in the morning think of what a privilege it is to be alive, to think, to enjoy, to love.” ‒ Marcus Aurelius
There is a burning platform that we all face in our lives right now.
And there are megatrends like climate change, technology, and urbanization along with exponential change impacting the way we live our lives.
And that will mean we have to think about life differently.
What is our burning platform?
The burning platform metaphor comes from the Piper Alpha Disaster of 1988 where workers lost their life because the oil rig exploded. Those who did survive had the choice of staying on the burning rig or jumping 150ft into the sea with burning debris. So, the choice was between certain or possible death. It was a terrible tragedy and those that did survive were the ones who jumped.
Since ‘The Burning Platform’ has been translated into organizational speak for big and generally urgent situations that will have massive impacts on how we work or live our lives.
We all recently faced the burning platform of the pandemic COVID-19 and the lockdown completely changing the way we live and work. Because of this a lot of people would have moved from a living mindset to a survival mindset.
A living mindset means you are acting on autopilot most of the time because you have programmed or conditioned yourself to act without thinking or expending too much energy. You can do what you would be doing most days with a limited amount of thinking because you have done it before.
A survival mindset is different because you think, worry, and think about what you are doing. Because of this you become tired and can become stressed because of the need to think more. The brain actually expends more energy and hence why so many people have experienced fatigue.
The question is have you moved back to a living mindset or is your mindset in some state of hybridization between survival and living?
Over recent years new technology has made us think differently about the way we live and with advances like the Metaverse our thinking will be challenged again with new advances with AI and robotics our world will look so different in the future.
The burning platform we all face right now is not just the exponential change we are all experiencing but that what brought us success in the past will not be guaranteed in the future.
So, when we are faced with change now and in the future, the one thing that we can stay in control of is our mindset.
You can in fact choose to be who you want to be when you want to be at any given time.
And you can set your mind and your mindset.
This is why it is so important to focus on your mental health as well as your physical health.
So here are three simple steps to start.
When you wake up in the morning what version of yourself do you want to be?
Once you agree to be the best version of yourself what do you do every day?
When the best version of you is faced with a challenge how do they respond?
When you start to control your mind, you can then control your responses, and then you can control your life.
What burning platform are you faced with right now and how can reframing your mindset help?
“If you can build a muscle, you can build a mindset.” – Jay Shetty
Paul Corke, Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine
Paul Corke is an author, a keynote speaker, and considered to be a leading expert on mindset, innovation, and leadership. He is currently recognized as the No. 1 Health and Wellness Thought Leader & Influencer with @Thinkers360 and is also the Managing Director of Leadership Innovators an innovative leadership consultancy. He previously spent 25 years in the corporate world with award-winning results specializing in organizational effectiveness, employee engagement, talent management, and leadership development with experience in the UK, Ireland, Europe, the US, and the Middle East.
Paul is the author of Reframe Your Mindset: Redefine Your Success, has a podcast series to support the book, and has created The Mindset Journal all based on what he calls ‘The Mindset Equation for Success.’ Paul uses his research into the mindset and positive psychology along with the thinking from his books to provide thought leadership, leadership model design, leadership assessment, and solutions to help organizations build their leadership capability.
Paul has successfully built a leadership development strategy and provided solutions in the industries of Financial Services, Retail, Automobile, Charity, Information Technology, Education, and Local Government. His mission is to develop leaders the world now wants to see whilst also making a difference through B1G1working towards the UN Global Goals to help those in need across the world.
