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Last night was the opening of Touch 09 – both our client and one of our church initiatives – and it kicked derrière. We’ve worked very hard, but the stars are all the volunteers who have tirelessly put time and effort into making this conference a success.

As I stood there, watching the whole thing play out in front of me, whilst enjoying my clean task list, I picked up a thought that I’ve been playing with for sometime. Tens of thousands of hours have been spent in preparation for this conference to provide the stage for experience. But why is a rich, compelling experience necessary?

I’ve come to consider that destiny is made in the moment of decision. One decision made with conviction can change the course of your life. “I’ll never do that again”, “from now on, I will always do this”, “I’ve had enough of this”. A quality decision will rouse that most precious human resource, action, and action will lead to transformation.

I’ve preached for years about quality decisions, but I am only beginning to understand that experience induces decision. A tragedy in your life will induce a decision. An trivial experience that illuminates your mind will induce a decision. A good movie or book will induce an experience. A friend, role model – an extended experience – can induce multiple decisions.

Understanding this helps us understand why an experience is staged and not made. A compelling experience will be multi-touch, providing many ways that, through the five senses, a decision may be induced. But you cannot make the experience. Experience is in the eye of the beholder, and we can only stage – like a theatrical director, carefully placing each part in order – in the hope that our audience will be inspired to make a decision, and act.

Has a compelling experience ever induced you to make a life altering decision?