Synthesis of 15 Invaluable Laws of Growth - Chapter 1

I first listened to the 15 Invaluable Laws of Growth by John C. Maxwell in my car. It was a great "listen" but there were so many things that I wanted to capture and spend more time on that I thought investing in the paper copy made sense (this is a great side-effect for authors by the way - sell more books when you put them out in a number of media formats). I bought the book and started reading each chapter, doing the exercises at the end by writing notes in my personal notebook and thinking more about each point. Somewhere in that journey I decided to share my learnings with my family so I synthesized the chapter into a few key points that I shared with them. Since I now have the synthesis of each chapter, I want to share with you! To that end, here is the synthesis of Chapter 1: the Law of Intentionality. The key message that I took away from this chapter is that Growth doesn't happen by accident, but we tend to believe it does! There are many misconceptions along this line, and the ones I have been guilty of are:
- Assumption Gap: I assume that I will automatically grow.
- Mistake Gap: I am afraid of making a mistake.  An aside here, I am currently reading Sam Walton's (of Walmart fame), and the commentary from others in the book is that Sam just didn't care if made a mistake. He would simply get up, dust off and move on. He lost his first store after 5 years because he made a mistake when negotiating his lease. Imagine the difference in his life if he had given up because he lost his only store at that point!
-  Inspiration Gap:I don't feel like doing it.
-  Comparison Gap: Others are better than I am.

Intentionality is key to getting started and staying engaged. the quote I leave you with is, "You cannot change your destination overnight (you are where you are), but you can change your direction overnight".  That is intentionality.