You can make more friends in two months by becoming interested in other people than you can in two years by trying to get other people interested in you. – Dale Carnegie
Don’t forget the old you
Doug and I have spent a lot of time reviewing our old roles in life, and the jobs that we held. We’re moving forward and creating the new life that we desire. But that doesn’t mean we should forget about those in the past who may be interested in collaborating with us now.
I spent much of my life working in art related fields. Creativity was always the center of my interests, and it appears that it will always be so. I’m rewriting the script of my life, but it doesn’t have to be a brand new cast. Surely there are people from my past who will be excited to get behind the Doug initiative…(That sounds like a movie! Who to play Doug though? Maybe Leonardo DiCaprio).
Who springs to mind?
Click to read larger version. A long time ago, pre-university, pre-fatherhood and pre-Doug… Even my first AOL e-mail address (not functional).
I began to think of my past jobs, and the people who were friends and partners in getting things done.
Surprisingly, I haven’t reached out to most of these past collaborators to let them know about my Doug project!
Doug came up with a method to uncover people who may be supportive of our new drive towards contentment. For each job I had in the past, I ran it through the following list:
- Who did I work with directly that can help me now?
- Will they be interested in helping?
- Can I help them with their current projects?
- Who at the job was supportive but didn’t work directly with me?
- Do I have contact information for these people, and if not, I need to find it.
I’m happy to discover that even the less creative jobs I had, like working for a major city, produced contacts that may be interested in the Doug project. Now I need to contact them, re-establish communication (if it’s lapsed) and tell them about what I’m currently doing. It’s a two way street, just like online networking, so hopefully I can help them out as well.
I don’t have to start over from scratch to create a new life. There are many great people from my past that I didn’t realize I miss… It’s time to reach out and use the network I always had, but forgot about…
Exercise
Dig up the old networks!
Who do you already have in your network that you may have forgotten about? Think about each job that you’ve held in the past. Who did you work well with? Who was supportive? Take each job and ask the following questions:
- Who did I work with directly that can help me now?
- Will they be interested in helping?
- Can I help them with their current projects?
- Who at the job was supportive but didn’t work directly with me?
- Do I have contact information for these people, and if not, I need to find it.
Write down your answers and contact these people! You have nothing to lose, but much to gain…
Related articles
- Get To Know Your Supporters (And Be A Supporter Yourself). (dougdoeslife.com)
- 6 Lessons of Success We Can All Learn from Dale Carnegie (barebrilliance.wordpress.com)
Doug Does Life 
Have you taken his course? My husband did and I read all the books.. very interesting!
No I haven’t . I’ll take this as a recommendation to do so though.
I like this. The idea of finding people I have lost touch with is a good one! People are so busy these days, a good thing to do. Reach out! Thanks!
You’re welcome. I get so involved in the present that I forget to look back and remember those who were helpful in the past.I figured I’m not the only one who does this, so I wrote the post as a reminder.
Our greatest prospects are our current customers. People in our past are potential future customers (or partners).
Great post and ideas.
Thanks Michael… I’m slowing starting to pull all the pieces of my past into a new present whole. It’s nice to be able to pick and choose.