September 28 Meeting Recap

Mark Valenziano is an inspirational speaker who spent 30+ years as a corporate executive and entrepreneur. His goal in speaking is to help others take control of their own lives and create their best possible outcomes. To achieve this, Mark recommends a technique he uses that he describes as envisioning a movie of his life. He sees a problem or opportunity, he writes a mental script of how the problem or opportunity plays out, edits it,  plays the scene back, and revises until he can visualize a positive outcome. Mark's movie metaphor first came to him and became useful when he was a teenager confronted by an unexpected diagnosis: he would become blind due to a progressive disease of the eyes. At that turning point, Mark found himself screening a movie about how his life would unfold as a blind man, then got to work. Over time, he could see himself avoiding using the disability as a crutch, he "wrote out" the scenes of unhappiness and unemployment, and instead chose the scenes he wanted playing in his life's movie. Through continued use of the technique, Mark has developed it as a tool to deal with other important parts of life, including loss, success, avoidance, and even in creating his own brand. Thank you to Mark and host Jim Hartfiel for leaving us much to think about!