I've sat at my computer all morning trying to get my teeth into the opening of this month's newsletter. It's as if couldn't open the bottle of mineral water with my hands, so I put the plastic cap of the bottle into my mouth. As the hours tick by the desire to write something substantial starts the initial turn of the cap. These words make a toe hold onto the page as I feel the cap turn all of the way. The act of wanting to make something happen in the literary sense is really a study in discipline. Certainly I will have the continued discipline to see this month's topic through to its conclusion.

Writing "The Leadership Lens" has also become an ingrained habit. It's how I see the world. I find myself reading the newspaper, an obscure magazine that has caught my eye, or an interesting book, and I highlight the page as a possible contender for a future article. By writing about the subjects highlighted, I have become my own self-fulfilling prophecy in which these topics will continue to get aired. This is known as the 'Observer Effect.' The very act of recording my thoughts will alter the phenomena being observed. It is my hope this month to affect the act of serendipity in a positive way.

Serendipity is the process of making discoveries quite by accident. It's finding a new restaurant in a quaint neighborhood while lost. Even though my wife and I had a GPS navigation system in our automobile in London on our way to Richmond Park, we decided to ignore 'Julia' for a few moments. Yes, we nicknamed the English female voice of the GPS system. Julia must have needed her medication as 'she' kept having us go around in rectangles. In an automobile where streets are both horizontal and vertical means one goes round in rectangles as opposed to circles. The third time Julia had us turn right in the same spot, we went straight ahead instead. We wound up in the London neighborhood of Barnes off of the A306. Barnes has a tremendous amount of character with lovely shops and restaurants.

This unique experience would not have been able to take place without our taking a risk to do something different. In Boston Symphony Orchestra conductor Ben Zander's book, "The Art of Possibility," he says, "It is dangerous for our musicians to be so obsessed with competition because they will find it difficult to take the necessary risks with themselves to be great performers." The quality and character of our very lives depends upon taking risks to allow for serendipitous situations to occur. We need to make the space for accidental discoveries and taken over time, these new discoveries will open up doors and combinations we would never have imagined. Yet we must take a risk to get us into situations outside of our comfort zones.

On a recent photography assignment, I met a venture capitalist that had traveled to China eight times over the last 18 months. His journal was published about his experiences of trying to break into the market of that country. I recognized him from the picture next to his article and went over to congratulate him. Here was a businessman who seemed to value the idea of literary discipline even if his journal entries were mostly about business meetings. I asked him if he had ever taken a trip to the Great Wall of China. His next few words altered my impression of him. He said, "It would take an entire day from the capital city of Beijing, so it would be a waste to go there."

Waste indeed. The first Emperor of China, Qin Shi Huang, built the most famous part of the Great Wall between 220 and 200 BC, and it is the world's longest man-made structure. While the Great Wall is full of history and breathtaking views, there is also an entire adventure awaiting the traveler going to and from the structure. Unfortunately, some people are more interested in adding an extra business meeting at another City Airport Hotel that they sacrifice the new connections that could occur and the richness that could be added to their lives by doing something 'risky.'

Adding a day to your business travel, turning off your PDA (personal digital assistant) or not listening to your GPS system might be risky, but these are the very ingredients required for serendipity to occur. The process of taking a few wrong turns or saying you are not available to go with the crowd to the business dinner opens up a world of possibilities ranging from the discovery of a new neighborhood to touching the massive bricks making up sections of the Great Wall. These changes in our routines added up over time will form a habit allowing new ideas to seep into your consciousness and innovation to occur in your organization. New innovative ideas will occur when you take the time to alter your perceptions of a place and at the same time this will improve the connection you have to yourself.