Featuring Good People

The future of our business and our relevance as trusted advisors is going to be built by those who can master the art of being human.  The advent of artificial intelligence has relegated traditional intelligence and knowledge to the arena of the supercomputer.  No longer are advisors needed for information or solutions as our consumers have all of that power in the palm of their hand on their phone.  What they do need is a relationship with a human to bring courage, relevance, understanding and emotion into the experience of navigating the choppy waters of their financial adventure.  While may industries are being disrupted by increasing automation and the supercomputing power of AI, our business remains relevant because of this human need.  AI is many times more efficient in the logic of solutions and information but has a hard time processing the logic of emotion and relationship.  It also lacks what we consider common sense due to the context needed for human decisions.  As we look into future, we must have an eye on how we best meet the shifting market needs.  What I see the market needing is good people; people with education, a strong character, the ability to selflessly serve the greater community and build bridges with differing cultures and peoples, people with strong work ethic who strive to innovate and create new ways of providing value to their clients.  At FGP we must be known for our ability to grow and Feature Good People.

As humans we share the meta-drives of inner peace, contact with reality or realness and the need for prosperity or growth.  As we have spoken of recently the practice of mediation is one way to grow towards inner peace.  Meditation as a practice can lead to living a life of mindfulness.  Mindfulness has become a buzz word in our culture and often times I have found its usage to lack the depth and meaning found in the the traditions it was born out of.  Mindfulness as a state of being is a moment by moment awareness of both the depths of soul and simultaneous awareness of the reality of the cosmos around the soul.  It is state that is aware of the shifting sands of experience while remaining rooted in the unmovable and infinite stillness of being.  This state allows for the witnessing of experience without the need to impose a superficial will upon the external world.  This ability creates the experience of deep connectedness and empathy with the other.  In this felt experience is a unity that we as humans carry a deep hunger to move towards.  This inner silence creates space for the other to move into and affords the potential for communion-the meeting of souls. 

The deepest fear of our species is survival.  The fear of death causes us to behave in ways at odds with the flourishing of our soul.  This fear is manifested in the realm of money.  The plethora of decisions we make based on fear around money causes us to put soulful things lower in the priority list.  As we advance human capital by redefining the intersection of people and money toward financial security, each conversation with clients becomes a platform to meet soul to soul as we guide our clients toward a healthy relationship with their financial decisions.

This year I encourage you to include the practice of meditation and contemplation into your daily lives.  Practicing the art of stillness and silence will allow the turbulence of your soul gremlins to come to the surface and be let go.  This process will increase your ability to meet your clients soul to soul and build deeper more meaningful meetings.  This ability will increase your value and referability as you continue to differentiate yourself from the competition.  As you do this individually we will grow collectively to be know in our markets as FGP: Fricking Good People.

Suggested reading: Awareness by Anthony De Mello