Your Mastermind Group
In the Christian Bible (Matthew 18:20 KJV) it says:
“For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.”
What this means in ‘secular’ terms is that when small groups of people gather together, when you and I meet together, there is a ‘third party’ also present.
This ‘third party’ has many names – the Force, the Holy Spirit, God, the ‘Power of the Universe’, ‘Nature’ – the name doesn’t matter – ‘something’ more that the people involved is there.
Now you and I can choose to involve or make use of this other participant in our meeting or not.
In the latter half of the 19th Century a group of men used to meet on a regular basis, every couple of months to discuss what they were doing, find solutions to problems and bounce ideas off each other.
They were Henry Ford, Thomas Edison, Harvey Firestone and William McKinley (later President of the USA).
These meetings – together with the invisible presence – spawned the electric light, pneumatic tyres, the production line and the significant changes in US foreign and internal policy during McKinley’s Presidency.
On the other hand, in the latter half of the 20th century during the Presidencies of Kennedy and Nixon other groups of people met together but chose to exclude any ‘outside assistance’. Only the ‘insiders’ were allowed to contribute and any critical evaluation or new ways of looking at things were excluded.
This resulted in the Watergate affair and the disastrous ‘Bay of Pigs’ attempt at an invasion of Cuba.
This exclusion of ‘outside interference’ is commonly known as ‘Groupthink’ – the thinking (such as it is) is retained within the group. Usually a group who are already committed to a particular outcome.
You and I can see this happening right now.
The key to this goes back to the verse from Matthew: “in my name”.
You see, it’s essential that when you and I meet with others to discuss problems or ideas or our ‘vision’ we must be ‘open minded’.
Our minds must be open to the acceptance of ‘suggestions’ from, if you like to call it that, a ‘higher power’.
To achieve a ‘good’ result you and I need to be ‘partners in believing’ that we are not ‘on our own’ and that also there may be other options for the issues we are discussing.
Yes, you and I can do this ‘on our own’ in partnership with the higher power; but everything is amplified exponentially when we work together in what has come to be known as a ‘Mastermind Group’.
Napoleon Hill in ‘Think and Grow Rich’ described such a group as –
“The coordination of knowledge and effort of two or more people, who work toward a definite purpose, in the spirit of harmony.”
In other words, the same thing as described in Matthew 18:20.
Now a lot of people have attempted to ‘productise’ this idea and it has been picked up and ‘formalised ‘or ‘structured’ by many companies.
Unfortunately, this is leading to it being categorised as just another business fad, following on from what was previously the flavour of the month.
Our mastermind group doesn’t need a rigid structure or agenda, or lots of supporting IT or ‘business tools’.
In fact, it doesn’t have to have anything to do with ‘business’ at all, and it’s not about a team of people striving to reach a common goal.
It’s on a higher plane than that.
It’s about individuals, you and I, helping each other to understand and realise what we individually want to achieve and calling upon the ‘presence’ that is all around us and within us.
Not in a religious or ritualised way, but in a ‘natural’ and relaxed way that will ‘allow the ideas to come’.
So who would you like to have in your Mastermind Group? Who are your Ford, Edison. Firestone and McKinley?
Make a list.
Get started.
Let’s all have a great week.
