Last year one of my dearest friends and I put together a mastermind group and I highly recommend it to anyone who has goals they want to accomplish.  I had first heard of mastermind groups from Tony Robbins probably 8-10 years ago.  He described a mastermind group as a collection of people who mutually support eachother in achieving their goals.  I thought mastermind groups were for entrepreneurs, but really they are for any collection of people who want to support eachother in achieving goals in any category such as financial, social, health, relationships, and business.

So when my friend, Vicki, suggested we start a group, I was interested.  She had been part of a mastermind group a couple of years earlier and was happy to be involved in one again.  Today our mastermind group consists of 6 women.  We meet twice a month at Vicki’s house and our meetings last one hour.  We have a manual and a structure that we follow to ensure the meetings don’t turn into chat sessions.  We’re very serious about supporting each other in achieving our goals and respect the time of everyone present.

The basic tenet of our mastermind group is that we ask the mastermind (which is the collective energy of everyone present) to support us in achieving a very specific goal.  Each meeting we bring an “I Ask” statement.  For example, “I, Erin Pavlina, ask the mastermind’s support in achieving a vibrant state of health and vitality now.”  We each read our statement and then open up the floor to comments.  The goal is to allow these other women, who may be able to see something you cannot, to gently guide you to creating the best intention possible for what you really want.  People suggest wording changes and we read and re-read our intention until we are really a vibrational match for it.  Sometimes we uncover blocks and break through them.  Sometimes we hit something very emotional and have support in dealing with it.  Sometimes we throw out an “I Ask” and start over completely.  By the end of the meeting everyone has an intention that works for them.  Each member of the mastermind is asked to hold that intention to help it manifest for that person.  At the next meeting we start out by sharing our success with that previous intention before moving on to our next intentions.  Sometimes we use the same intention for one or two months, and sometimes it’s different every meeting.

Thanks to my mastermind group I have been able to really focus on what it is I want to achieve.  You can’t really come in with something too wishy-washy or something that isn’t really that important to you because it doesn’t take the other women long to ferret out what you’re really after.  There is a great deal of love and trust inside our circle.

We like the size of our group, and if a member leaves we have been easily able to find a replacement that fits us perfectly.  Everyone in our group has life experiences and wisdom to share with everyone else.  When you’ve got 5 other people helping you focus your intentions things happen!

If you want to form your own mastermind group, here are the steps I recommend you take.

1.  Size matters.  Decide how big or small you want your group to be.  If you’ve got 6 members you can get through a meeting in about an hour.  If you’ve got 12 consider that it could take 2 hours to get through everyone’s successes and new intentions.  I recommend 6-8 as a very workable group.

2.  Trust and love.  It’s very important that all the members in the mastermind group be trustworthy and coming from a place of love.  If you have jealousy, that won’t work because instead of holding your intention they may actually try to sabotage you.  And trust is important since a lot of very personal and private things are discussed at a meeting and it’s important to respect people’s privacy.  What is said and revealed in a mastermind meeting never leaves the meeting.

3.  Time and location.  Select a time and location that will work for everyone.  Stay committed to meeting at the same time and location if possible.  New members should conform to the established time and location because moving it around every time a new person joins could ruin it for the established members.

4.  Invoke the power of the mastermind.  Before we get going with our meeting we ground and center ourselves, pulling our energy into the “now” so that we can focus on what we’re trying to achieve instead of kavetching about our problems.  Someone reads an inspiring paragraph that invokes the power of our mastermind group.  What you say and/or invoke is entirely up to all of you. 

5.  Come prepared.  We meet on Wednesdays, so on the Monday beforehand we have sent our ”I Asks” to every member via email.  On Wednesday we all show up with everyone’s intentions printed on a sheet of paper.   We don’t want people showing up to a meeting without knowing their intention because it takes up too much of the group’s time while one is formed.  If someone doesn’t have an “I Ask” we just skip them that week. 

6.  Close with love.  We read another invocation at the end of our meeting to thank everyone for sharing their time and energy and for holding the intentions of the other members. 

I love my mastermind group and everyone in it.  We all come from diverse backgrounds, we’re all in different lines of work, we’re all at different places financially, and we’re all different ages.  But there is a great amount of wisdom in all of us.  When we come together we help each other grow and achieve our goals.  Just two hours a month and yet such a powerful benefit.  A big shout out to my mastermind group: Vicki, Aimee, Audrey, Cheri, and Janice Marie!  Thanks for being there and seeing in me what I sometimes forget.  You’re all awesome!

Would a mastermind group benefit you?  Do you know anyone right now who would be interested in starting one with you?  Think about it.

You may want to visit our Local Groups forum and see if anyone in your area is interested in starting a mastermind group with you.

Discuss this post in the Erin Pavlina forum.

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This entry was posted on Monday, July 2nd, 2007 at 1:30 pm and is filed under Inspiration, Personal Development. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.