#WhyIQuest: challenge with encouraging support.
Every December, Tracking Wonder gathers a dynamic group of individuals for a free online program we call Quest: 12 days of collective envisioning with 12 inspiring influencers, providing instigations and insights for those on a quest to do business as unusual in the new year. Together, we seek meaning, integrity, and impact in life and career while remembering that Do It Together beats Do It Yourself.
The Quest community includes hundreds of bold Business Artists: writers, teachers, artists, healers, entrepreneurs, and more. Each one has a different reason for Questing – a different fire that drives them to pursue a new way of doing life and business. As we prepare for Quest 2017, which begins on December 1, we asked a few of our veteran participants to share #WhyIQuest and what Quest has meant to them.
Today, we’re introducing you to Peggy Acott, a writer and Life-Cycle Celebrant who crafts and officiates weddings and other ceremonies. Below, Peggy tells us how Quest’s deep, exploratory prompts (and true community) helped her uncover her commitment to a novel that she then worked on for all of 2016. To join her and the rest of the Quest community in December, you can sign up at bit.ly/quest2017; then, use the #WhyIQuest hashtag on the social media platform of your choice to announce your participation and your key reason(s) for Questing (and to meet your fellow Questers in the process).
Why did you join Quest? What role did community play in your Quest experience?
Peggy: Joining Quest was an easy decision; I already appreciated Jeffrey Davis and Tracking Wonder, having participated in online webinars as well as in-person at the Your Brave New Story week-long intensive workshop. Knowing firsthand how deftly Jeffrey crafts a learning experience and the dynamic people – both presenters and participants – that he attracts, I anticipated an engaging and stimulating experience in Quest2016. I wasn’t disappointed; it was intense and challenging (not in a bad way, at all), but ultimately an encouraging and supportive environment by virtue of the group of people present. Truly a community – reaffirming Jeffrey’s maxim that “DIT beats DIY.” Some of the people who participated in the month’s Quest remain colleagues and friends to this day.
Tell us about an “ah-ha!” moment during Quest when you made a break-through that helped clarify your mission or direction.
There were a few “ah-ha” moments during the course of the Quest – those times when I read an unexpected depth of self-knowledge coming through the pen in response to the prompts. Reading back through some of the responses with hindsight recently reaffirmed that I had a stronger idea of what I was about at that point in my life than I would have thought. All it took was someone asking the “hard questions” and my willingness to be open to the answers. I think this was also the biggest surprise. An “I didn’t know I had it in me” kind of discovery! Especially surprising to me was the discovery of a sound and self-secure devotion and commitment to the novel that I have continued to work on through this year; my willingness to keep faith with myself and follow the urgings of “the story that won’t let me go.”
What was the biggest surprise of last year’s Quest? What about the biggest challenge—and how did you overcome it?
While it is true that Quest2016 wasn’t for the faint of heart – the questions were deep and probing, but not gratuitous, the pace intense and fairly constant – the accepting and supportive community that formed around the Quest provided a safe haven from which to be able to dig deep, be vulnerable, not have to be perfect or have it all figured out.
How has Quest continued to play a role in your life or business throughout 2016?
Along with the wonderful people I have met and connections forged through this process, I think it is the willingness to stay open to the questions, to explore and discover as I go along without certainty, that has been the greatest gift of the Quest. and that I have carried forward throughout this past year.
Join Tracking Wonder this December for 12 days of collective envisioning with 12 inspiring influencers and a crew of fellow Business Artists: those on a quest to do business as unusual in 2017. Together, we’ll seek meaning, integrity, and impact in life and career while remembering that Do It Together beats Do It Yourself.
Join the Quest at http://bit.ly/quest2017 – then, join us on social media and share your reason #WhyIQuest.
