Watch Over Your Snow Globe

(Excerpt from my soon-to-be-published book,

Just One Step: The Journey to Your Unstoppable You)

Last week I shared my perspective on the metaphor of snow globes – specifically, the need to regularly shake your snow globe to avoid settling. This week I want to address another reality of the snow globe metaphor in your lives – the importance of watching over your own snow globe.

My friend Robin Sacks wrote a wonderful book called Get Off My Bus!: How to Get Clarity, Get in the Driver’s Seat, and Get Moving in Your Life! (Outskirts 2010), which encourages us all to get certain people off of our life bus. In other words, to get off your bus the people who discourage you, deplete you and get in your way. It’s a simple and profound concept – getting people off your bus – and I recently realized that when you kick them off your bus you’ve got to do one more thing. You have to take back your snow globe when they leave your bus.

If you’re wondering how the hell these other people got their hands on your snow globe, the answer is simple and sad – you gave it to them! Yes, you heard me right – you’ve given your snow globe to other people and most of you have also surrendered it to the vagaries of circumstances. By the way, in nearly every case you didn’t consciously or intentionally give up your snow globes, but you did give it up.

Sometimes we give up our snow globes because we want to avoid personal responsibility for our lives and our outcomes. Sometimes we give them up because we’re afraid. Sometimes we give them up because we’re simply tired of being responsible. Many times we give up our snow globes to the people closest to us either because they asked us for them (usually unconsciously) or we believe that handing over our snow globes to someone else is an act of love or an investment in the relationship.

No matter what the cause or circumstances of you giving up and handing over your snow globe, it’s time to reclaim your snow globes (all of them) and to take personal responsibility for them and for their shaking. If you’re feeling all shook up, look around and take back your snow globes!

If you’d like to receive these Daily Wake Up Calls every morning via email, join our community of different thinkers by signing up here. Please also join me on Facebookand Twitter.