“What you get by achieving your goals is not as important as what you become by achieving your goals.”
– Henry David Thoreau
To become a Transformation Leader, you have to learn to move past thinking "outside the box" to "beyond the box", and ultimately what we call "
bubble jumping". Rob's story is a perfect example of this. Rob was tired of being the skinniest guy around. The so called “freshman-fifteen” skipped him in college, and into his early twenties he remained the lankiest person in town. Every year he’d get a gym membership (thinking outside the box), and after a month or so he’d start showing progress, but something would always come up – he’d miss a few weeks, those weeks would turn into months, and finally he’d cancel the membership (returning to the box). He was very frustrated by this cycle of failure.
Einstein called this “insanity,” which he defined as “doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” Rob finally started to get results when he began “thinking
beyond the box.” Ford Taylor in his
Transformational Leadership Training and Business Consulting course defines "beyond the box" thinking as deciding to step out of the box with a resolve
not to make a return to that box. Rob had heard about a new kind of fitness regimen that was super competitive and provided a certain amount of peer accountability to the workouts. Since he'd made up his mind that returning to the box was no longer an option, he figured this new regimen's accountability component might be the thing that he had been missing before.
As it turned out, his accountability partners became like a family. They encouraged each other when they were struggling, but they also brought a competitive edge! Rob hated feeling slightly behind everyone when he missed a day. Ford Taylor calls this kind of accountability “bumper buddies” – it’s one of the nine dynamics of change. A bumper buddy is someone who bumps you back on track to accomplish your goals if things get a little off track. Bumper buddies are vital to thinking beyond the box, because “thinking beyond the box” eventually leads to that place where it is just as uncomfortable to get back in the box as it is to just keep going.
This played out as Rob hit his usual “burn-out-after-a-few-months” mark. He was showing remarkable results and weighed more than he ever had before. But then he missed almost two weeks because of a vacation and an out of town wedding. His first day back to the gym was extremely discouraging. He’d fallen significantly behind his friends, and his motivation to continue was very low. However, since he’d made up his mind not to quit (or return to the box), and he had his bumper buddies in place to encourage him to come back – he rededicated himself, and jumped back in. Rob is now a body builder, and he and his wife regularly compete in fitness competitions.
This is how “beyond the box” thinking leads to what is known as “bubble jumping.” What do we know about bubbles? Sooner or later, they always pop! Once a bubble pops, it’s gone - it no longer exists. Since it no longer exists, it can't be returned to! Rob’s “beyond the box” mindset essentially placed him in a bubble. That bubble popped when he got back from vacation, but he was so far removed from his box, he basically had left himself no choice but to jump from his recently burst bubble into another bubble that would carry him even further yet.
A transformational leader is one who is adept at “bubble jumping.” What kind of thinker are you? Are you fed up with trying to “think outside the box,” only to crawl right back into it? Try to start thinking beyond the box and make your return to the box a non-option. This will poise you for bubble jumping! Remember, a bubble is formed when the pressure on the outside is equal to the pressure on the inside. Eventually that pressure changes and the bubble pops, but there will always be another bubble to jump to!
“For God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control.”
– 2 Timothy 1:7 (ESV)
