Friday, May 31, 2019

Letting Go Of Hope?

"Forgiveness is letting go of the hope
that the past can be changed."

-- Oprah Winfrey



When you think about people who are holding on to a grudge or thoughts of past wrongs, etc., it really puts it into perspective that somehow they are hoping and wanting somehow that the past can be changed. If only that other person would do amends, right the wrongs, admit their errors, we could maybe get past this place. But, we all seem to know that those things won't change the past and we even say it that way.

Of course, they can't change the past, but we certainly can change today, this moment, and one of the most effective ways to do that would be letting go of the hope that the past can be changed. Once we let go of that hope--even by seeing that this is a hope--we can perhaps just let it rest in peace and move back into the present.

Besides, dealing with all that past in the present just stops us from living. Think of a rope and the more it is tugged on, the more the tugging back. Now, drop the rope and walk away. There is peace right there. That is an act of peace.

Tuesday, May 28, 2019

Take Off The Training Wheels!

"If you'd like to teach 
a kid to ride a bike, 
training wheels are a bad idea." 

-- Seth Godin 




Seth continues: "You're much better off with a small bike with no pedals. All training wheels do is confuse, distract or stall." And, since Seth Godin is a marketing author and expert, he adds, "the same is true for marketing. You don't need to go to school for four years. You need to do marketing." He also says that "the same thing is true for leadership. Find something worth doing, find others to join in."

Have you ever tried to ride a bike with training wheels? It just doesn't feel right. One of the unique things about a bike is that it has a roll axis, unlike a car with four wheels. In other words, we can lean right or left, and in fact, that ability to lean has a great deal to do with riding a bike, and training wheels stops the roll axis, and you can watch a little kid on a bike with training wheels trying to lean and they can't. It's a silly protectionist thing that a parent would put on a bike because they are afraid the child will come to harm. But it slows the process of learning to a crawl.

It would be like trying to fly a plane with it attached to a pole. A plane has, even more, freedom than a bike because instead of two axes, roll, and yaw, it has three--roll, pitch, and yaw. Left or right leaning, up or down, and right or left pointing. Training wheels on a bike limit the rider to one axis: yaw. It takes all the freedom away.

Our freedom is in our ability to decide, to do or to act. As we consider the fear of decision's ramifications, and/or the unknown aspects of doing something we may have never done before, we attach training wheels to our life. It feels weird but safer, and yet, it isn't safe at all. We can feel inside that it doesn't feel right. We can feel the resistance and restraint involved. We have imprisoned ourselves, lost our freedom.

Because we so strongly want freedom, we rebel against the self-created resistance and restraint, and with the ego's complete cooperation, we begin blaming others, external forces, and more. And yet, our freedom is always fully in our control if we will only become aware of that power. Training wheels will not help us learn to use this power, we must simply exercise it, trust it will all be okay and move.

Freedom is also our willingness and ability to fail and to learn from those failures. The label, fail or failure is made up. Truly there are only results, and we can then make adjustments if the results are not as desired. Pema Chodron wrote a short book about leaning into the unknown. The title is, Fail. Fail Again. Fail Better. I

Take off the training wheels! Freedom awaits!

Saturday, May 25, 2019

Empowering Communication: "Tell me more" | Christine Tackett | TEDxAkron


Chris Tackett MSN RN has been in the field working directly with clients who are anxious, depressed or suicidal for nearly 20 years as a mental health nurse, a nursing professor at Herzing University- Akron and as a life coach and CEO of Omni Institute of Integrative Wellness. She teaches communication techniques to nurses who must deal with difficult conversations ranging from anger, sadness, anxiety, grief, pain, and need for knowledge. Her passion is for our children because of an alarming 11% of youth report suffering from at least one major depressive episode in the past year. Major Depression comes with significant and constant feelings of sadness, suicidal thoughts, impaired concentration and little to no engagement in normal activities. 

Wednesday, May 22, 2019

Celebrate Your Successes!

"Acknowledge Your Positive Past:
Because the brain more easily remembers 
events that were accompanied by strong emotions, 
most people underestimate and underappreciate 
the number of successes they've had
in relation to the number of failures, they've had.
One of the ways to counteract this phenomenon
is to consciously focus on 
and celebrate your successes."

-- Jack Canfield, 
Principle 26 of The Success Principles




Jack Canfield's book, The Success Principles contains 64 principles to success and all are short enough to read in a few minutes, come back any time, or just open the book where ever you might like and pull out a gem of wisdom.

This one is great because he says that we are trained in this pattern early with our parents and in grade school. A lot of people get upset if we don't perform properly and punish us or yell at us to help guide us to do better, but what really happens is we become more emotionally involved in the failures and that makes it seem sometimes that we have more failure than success.

Jack says, "the sad truth is that we all have many more victories than failures--it's just that we set the bar too high for what we call a success." He goes on to talk about a participant in one of his programs who told that he left Iran for Germany where he learned the language and became an auto mechanic. Then he had the opportunity to come to America, learn English, and was learning how to be a welder, but he thought he was not a success. Come to find out, his idea of success was having a home in Beverly Hills and driving a luxury car! Yet, to many others, his life was an ongoing massive success.

Jack talks about creating a Victory Log, which can be a fancy leather-bound diary or a spiral notebook. It is just something that you record your successes or victories regardless of the size of them to later show how many you have. Success needs to be reinforced.

He adds to display your success on a success wall and look at it often. Make it so that your successes, however minor they may seem to get the attention they deserve, or rather, you deserve to create in each of us a stronger and more risk-taking self-esteem. It's not about bragging, it's about putting things in perspective.

We may as well let our successes lead the way.

Sunday, May 19, 2019

How to Develop an Attitude of Gratitude | Jack Canfield


If I could teach you only ONE THING to help you live a happier and more successful life, it would be this: Your mindset determines your reality. You get what you expect, whether it be positive or negative. Your outlook will begin to define your results.

Thursday, May 16, 2019

Making Waves and Breaking Barriers


From the time she could walk, Sasha Christian has been riding waves. She discovered her love of wakeboarding at the age of five and has been testing the limits of the sport ever since, earning the title of Singapore’s National Wakeboard Champion four years in a row. Now, the homegrown darling is training Singapore’s next generation of female wakeboarders to push through the fear and set new standards.

Friday, May 3, 2019

The Highest Calling Of Leadership



"The growth and development of people
is the highest calling of leadership."

-- Harvey S Firestone


What are some of the ways of helping the development and growth of people in an organization? Here are some thoughts:

Leaders are readers. Lead by example by being a reader and a life-long learner. I don't need to know everything, but I want to continue learning and expanding my own knowledge and thereby share that passion with my team and others around me. I know how much of a difference it has made in my life and I know how much of a difference it will make it others as well.

Micro-managing is an ego trip and it stifles growth. Learn how to delegate and trust and have more patience. This is a challenge for many. It is easy to do a thing myself, and certainly easier than trying to teach someone else to do it or wait until they are up to speed, but I realize I can't do it all and if I keep doing it all, the company cannot grow.

Don't tell people how to do everything. Give them basic guidelines and let them use their creativity and skills to do it better than I might do it. We have graphic designers and the less instruction I give them, the better the product they produce. I love to see people do it better than me. It helps me grow and it helps them grow.

Challenge people to solve problems. Let your team help you solve problems.

Praise and encouragement is high on the list of things that motivate me, so I use them in the same way to help uplift team members.

This is certainly not a complete list, and I'm sure you can add to it. I hope some of these ideas are beneficial to your growth and that of your team.

A healthy, growing company requires healthy, growing people.