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Happy News - Gratitude and Giving Will Lead to Your Success
http://www.happynews.com/news/10272010/gratitude-giving-will-le...
Gratitude and Giving Will Lead to Your Success

OCTOBER 27, 2010 David J. Pollay, HappyNews Columnist
Think of some of your life achievements. Its okay. No ones watching. Go ahead. What accomplishments make you proud of yourself? Now, ask how many of these life accomplishments did you achieve completely on your own. We all know the answer: none. Our successes always come with help. The real question is, Can you name the people who contributed to each of your successes? Who are they and what did they do? Stop for a moment, and write down their names. Think about these people. Now, Ill bet youre feeling a bit of gratitude right now. You just reminded yourself of the important roles others have played in your life. You have not traveled alone. Most of us feel some amount of stress when we think about what it will take to achieve our dreams. We think, How in the world am I going to get from here to where I hope to be? Luckily, the answer is, not alone. Other people will help us. So whats the best way to achieve your life goals? Heres the first answer. Look to the people who have already helped you. Thank each one personally and privately. Tell them why they are important to you and how they helped you succeed in the past. Let these people know how valuable they are to you. If you feel that youve thanked someone before, consider doing it again in an even more meaningful way. Keep these people in your corner. Pychologist Christopher Peterson writes in his book, A Primer in Positive Psychology, In our experience with many dozens of gratitude letters they work 100% of the time in the sense that the recipient is moved, often to tears, and the sender is gratified as well. Gratitude researcher Robert Emmons found in his research that experiencing feelings of gratitude improves the quality of our lives. Emmons discovered that people who feel gratitude are more likely to help others. Emmons writes, Gratitude leads not only to feeling good, but also to doing good. Heres the second answer to achieving your life goals. Think about who else could help you. Through a lens of gratitude, think about how you could contribute to the mission of others in advance of their support. What could you do for them now? How could you help them in some way? Your commitment to helping them will demonstrate two things: You care about what they care about, and you appreciate the role they could play in your life. You will stand out as a giver, and leave the takers of the world standing in line. Your new contacts will be grateful to you. And we know what happens when people feel gratitude. Gratitude and giving will lead to your success.
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10/29/2010 12:28 PM
Happy News - How to Get More Ah-Hah! Moments in Your Life
http://www.happynews.com/news/9272010/ah-hah-moments-life.htm
How to Get More Ah-Hah! Moments in Your Life

SEPTEMBER 27, 2010 David J. Pollay , HappyNews Columnist
Think! Think harder. Come on! Think. How often have you said that to yourself? If you just think harder and faster, youll figure it out. Science is saying, Wait a minute. Literally, the message is, Wait a minute. Your most creative ideas do not come to you after you squint and make a thinking sound, mmmmm. Research is pointing to a better way to get the best answers: Its through your unconscious mind. Think about it. When have some of the best and most important ideas come to you in your life? Where were you? What were you doing at the time? Most of us report that our most creative ideas come to us when were exercising, reading a thought-provoking book, praying, meditating, doing laundry, playing with our children, sitting on a plane, driving a car, or when waking up in the morning. Isnt it great when a big idea suddenly comes to you? But how is it possible? You werent even thinking about it; your focus was somewhere else. Your conscious thought didnt produce it. It was your unconscious mind at work. Our brain never sleeps; its always on. Our brain is considered the most powerful supercomputer on the planet; its memory and problem solving power are unequaled. Researchers Ap Dijkersterhuis and Loran Nordgren of the University of Amsterdam describe the comparative power of the conscious and unconscious mind. Depending on the context, consciousness can process between 10 and 60 bites per second. As an illustration, if you read you process about 45 bits per second, which corresponds to a fairly short sentence. The entire human system combined, however, was argued to be able to process about 11,200,000 bits. So how do you use that power every day? What do you plug into your own personal supercomputer every day? What do you give it to process? Whats your positive ritual? Heres what I do each morning. Everyday after I express my thanks for everything good in my life, I tell myself that I am a writer. And I get detailed. I describe everything I find gratifying about writing, and I visualize my plans. Why? I love writing and I want to do more of it. I feed my supercomputer with these thoughts every day. Every morning I have a positive ritual of focusing my thinking on what I enjoy doing the most. So start each day by thinking about what you love to do. Give your unconscious mind something to think about while youre off consciously doing other things. And enjoy your next Ah-Hah! moment!
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10/29/2010 12:29 PM
Happy News - Look for Treasure. Your Key to Success.
http://www.happynews.com/news/12302009/look-treasure-key-succe...
Look for Treasure. Your Key to Success.

DECEMBER 30, 2009 David J. Pollay, HappyNews Columnist
I learned early in life that its easy to be a critic. You can find fault with anything. The challenge is to sift through life looking for the good things, opportunities, and lessons to be learned. (1) Dads view When I was growing up in Milwaukee, the largest electronics superstore in the area was a company called American TV. And the owner, Len Mattioli, was famous in Wisconsin. He was known as Crazy TV Lenny and he was constantly pitching his store on radio and television. He was always yelling in his ads: Buy a washer, get a bike! Buy a TV, get a bike! He hawked his products at full volume. One day I said to my father, Dad this guy is nuts. Hes always yelling! And my father said to me, David, hes a good businessman. My dad was right: Dad could see that American TVs business was growing quickly. Mattioli did more than yell. Crazy TV Lenny found a way to draw people into his store. In fact, Mattioli took the original store and turned it into a chain of fifteen electronics superstores in the Midwest. (2) Bills view I met Bill Zito the summer before we both left Milwaukee for Yale University. One day we were sitting in the upper grandstand at the old County Stadium watching the Milwaukee Brewers play. I was asking him about all the players. Bill knew them: He had been the Brewers official batboy. So, I asked him: Whats Cecil Cooper like? Bill said: Excellent guy. How about Paul Molitor? Excellent guy. And what about Robin Yount? Super-excellent guy. And this is how the conversation went as I talked to Bill about half the roster. I was surprised that everyone was an excellent guy. We all have heard so much in the news about professional ballplayers; I thought at least someone would not be so great. But in Bills eyes, everyone I asked about was an excellent or a super-excellent guy. Bills ability to see the good in players has served him well. He is now a sports agent with forty professional hockey players on his roster. (3) Prestons view Twenty years ago in New York City I was with my good friend Preston Kevin Lewis. We were looking for music in a record store when a song began to play. I leaned over the record bin and said, I dont like this music. And Preston quietly said, It doesnt do a lot for me, and kept looking through the stack of records. While the song I pointed out wasnt his favorite, Preston didnt spend any time focusing on the music he didnt like; instead he searched for the music he did like. Preston now works for Warner Brothers, after stints with HBO Home Video, MTV, and Disney. A lesson learned: Find the treasures I remember these stories because they are woven together in a lesson that has stuck with me over the past two decades: When you look for the good, and when you expect the good, youll find the good. When you want to learn something new, theres a treasure to be found. This week This week, observe yourself assessing the day-to-day events of your life, and the people you encounter. What do you say to yourself about them? What do you say to others?
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10/29/2010 12:32 PM
Happy News - Look for Treasure. Your Key to Success.
http://www.happynews.com/news/12302009/look-treasure-key-succe...
Then, heres the big question. When you make these comments publicly or privately, ask yourself: What am I learning right now? Do my comments and observations help me understand why someone is successful, why a business grows, and how a product sells? You will likely discover that your quick criticisms seldom lead you anywhere; they close the doors of your curiosity and creativity. Your life will remain as it is. But when you tune your mind to look for the hidden treasures in life, you will discover lessons that you can apply to your own goals and dreams. You will advance your life. Be a treasure hunter; the rewards are great.
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10/29/2010 12:32 PM
Happy News - The Power of Your Love Example
http://www.happynews.com/news/3172010/power-love-example.htm
The Power of Your Love Example

David J. Pollay , HappyNews Columnist
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Have you thought about what your love looks like? Is it warm? Is it kind? Is it accepting? Is it passionate? Is it committed? I learned many years ago that the love we show is the love we teach. They do not love that do not show their love, wrote Shakespeare. Our loved ones learn through our example. Fourteen years ago, just off a rural road in Maine, I saw the power of love. My dad pulled our car to the side of the country road. There were no other cars. The sun was shining, and the wind was blowing gently. We stepped out of the car and walked on the gravel towards the cemetery. Mom, Dad, and I came to visit the gravesites of my grandparents. Moms parents were buried in the cemetery nestled among small, family farms. Mom and Dad walked hand in hand as we approached the family plot. We were the only ones there. The cemetery was surrounded by an old rock wall hugged by lilac bushes, and framed by maple, pine, and oak trees. For over two centuries the graveyard had been the final home of many of our relatives. As we walked slowly on the recently cut grass, I read the names etched into the tombstones I passed. I wondered how many of these people my grandparents had known. We arrived at the foot of my grandparents resting place. My grandmother had passed first, so she was buried in the family plot to the left. Next to her was my grandfather; he passed away twelve years later. And between my grandfathers plot and the gravesite of someone we did not know, there was a small patch of grass. Pointing to it, Mom said, That was for me. Dad and I looked down at the ground. There was just enough room for one more plot. Mom said softly, My parents wanted to make sure that I was near them if I didnt marry. Dad and I looked at Mom. Uncertain, I asked, Do you want to be buried here? Mom hesitated. There isnt a place for your father, she said. I wouldnt want to be without him. I looked at Dad. He was staring straight ahead. Dad put his arm around Mom, and pulled her into him. He kissed her on the top of her head. I will always be with you, he said. He looked at her. If theres only one plot, it will be for you. Our boys will just have to lay my ashes around you. Dad held Mom in his arms. I looked down at the open spot of grass. Mom and Dad reached out to me. Emily Dickinson reminds us, Unable are the Loved ones to die / For Love is Immortality. The example of my parents love will be with me always. In his book, Spiritual Evolution, Harvard research psychiatrist George Vaillant, wrote: Love, like the sacred and our image of God, has a timeless quality. That day, just off that rural road in Maine, I saw true love. I saw how much my parents loved each other. Every day we have an opportunity to demonstrate our love to the most important people in our lives. So, what is your love example?
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10/29/2010 12:33 PM
Happy News - Three Questions that Matter
http://www.happynews.com/news/11272009/three-questions-matter.htm
Three Questions that Matter

NOVEMBER 27, 2009 David J. Pollay, HappyNews Columnist
How was school? What did you do today? These are some of the typical questions we ask our school-age children during dinner. The question is, how often do these questions lead to interesting and engaging answers? At some point in time, most of us have felt frustrated because we do not know the questions that will encourage our children to speak openly and meaningfully about their day. We want to know what is going on with them. We want to know what they are excited about. But questions that lead to answers such as fine, okay, and I dont remember, do not help us learn more about our children. Three questions Here are three questions that may help you and your family. These questions may lead you to some interesting, meaningful, and fun conversations at the dinner table with your children. Question #1 What was the "top" of your day? We know from Psychology that our experience in life is based on where we focus our attention. We want to give our children an opportunity to recall something positive in their day. Make sure to explain that the top of their day is a time when they were most satisfied, challenged, happy, or having fun. You can use this additional question to learn even more about what excites your children: Why was that the top of your day? Question #2 What did you learn today? Stanford psychology researcher, Carol Dweck, has spent decades researching what contributes most to our success in life. She sums up her findings in her book, Mindset: The New Psychology of Success. She wrote: If parents want to give their children a gift, the best thing they can do is to teach their children to love challenges, be intrigued by mistakes, enjoy effort, and keep on learning. That way, their children dont have to be slaves of praise. They will have a lifelong way to build and repair their own confidence. When we ask our children what they learned today, we are demonstrating our interest in their growth. We are as concerned with their practice as we are with their performance. We are also communicating that we want to see them stretch themselves every day. Learning is key. Consider asking this follow-up question to further focus your child on the importance of learning: How did you learn that today? Question #3 What were you grateful for today? We do our children a great service when we help them understand the power of gratitude. We help them realize how many good things and how many good people are in their lives. Our question gently directs them to think of what they value and care about. Sociologist Georg Simmel wrote, Gratitude, as it were, is the moral memory of mankind. Our inquiry prods them to thank the people that help them. And we know from Positive Psychology research that the more grateful we are, the happier we become. Think about asking one of these questions to deepen your gratitude conversations: Why are you grateful for that? and What about that makes you grateful? Questions guide and stimulate
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10/29/2010 12:34 PM
Happy News - Hug Now. Don't Save It.
http://www.happynews.com/news/10282009/hug-now-dont-wait.htm
Hug Now. Don't Save It.

Recently I arrived home from the office, and my dad was standing in the driveway. Dad is 62 and wears a full beard. Dad was talking with two pro football-sized construction workers. As I approached them, they all turned and looked at me. I said, Hi Dad. Hey guys. I then stepped forward, shook my dads hand, pulled him into me, hugged him, and gave him a kiss on the cheek. I then walked into the house. For three generations my family has done the same thing: We kiss and hug when we see each other. We kiss and hug when we say goodbye. And we dont care who is watching. My parents taught me through their example. My grandmother reinforced this practice by what she said to me thirty-five years ago. I was 9 years old. It was wintertime in Milwaukee. My family was leaving Northridge Shopping Mall after a movie. Mom, Dad, my brother Mike, and my grandparents were there. And I was mad at my dad. I still have no idea why. But I know that I was mad. I was pouting and I wasnt talking to him. It was snowing that night and the temperature was near zero. Dad told us to wait inside the mall so that he could warm up the van and pull it up to the front door. Thats when Nana came up to me and said, Your father loves you and you love him. Dont go to bed angry at him. Kiss and hug him before you go to bed tonight. Tell him that you love him. You never know when the Lord will take him from you. Few words have had such an impact on me as those of my grandmother that night. You never know when the Lord will take him from you. Dawn and I recently attended the funeral of a colleagues father who had passed away after a major heart attack. His son was eulogizing him. He said that one minute his father was talking; the next minute he was gone. My colleague was respectful of his father and he recalled good times. And then he said something that deeply saddened us: I never did hear my father say he loved me. My mother taught us to hug, kiss, and say that we love each other when we wake up, when we go to bed, before we leave the house, and before we hang up the phone. Psychology researchers have long talked about the importance of feeling a secure attachment to the ones you love. You need to feel confident and secure in anothers love for you; the positive impact in your life is far reaching. Demonstrating affection and saying whats in your heart are two powerful ways of nourishing your most cherished relationships. Tony Dungy, former head coach of the Indianapolis Colts of the National Football League, lost his 18 year-old son, James, a number of years ago. Eulogizing his son, Coach Dungy said that he had last seen his son at Thanksgiving. They had said goodbye before James left for the airport. Coach Dungy knew that he would see his son again soon; he did not think much about the casual way they said goodbye. But Coach Dungy never did see his son again. Coach Dungy said, I never got to hug him again. Thats one thing Ill always think about and always remind people to do: Hug em every chance you get.
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10/29/2010 12:34 PM
Happy News - The Law of the Narrator
http://www.happynews.com/news/4242009/law-narrator.htm
The Law of the Narrator

APRIL 24, 2009 David J. Pollay, HappyNews Columnist
There was a hum of conversation as the audience settled in. The band members quietly took their places on a dimly lit stage. The theatre operator brought the lights down. The audience grew quiet in anticipation. The emcee entered stage left; the spotlight followed him. The audience welcomed him with applause. The drummer started a quiet drum roll. The emcee began speaking in a Charlton Heston-like voice. He mesmerized the audience with a story of accomplishment and adventure: he told us about the act we were about to see. The drummer and emcee engaged in a choreographed dance of excitement: the drum roll matched the words as they came out faster, with more energy, and with the power of anticipation that a great event was about to take place. And all at once, the emcee called out their names, the band started playing, the act entered stage right, the spotlight swung over to meet them, the audience erupted in applause, and the singers launched into their first song in full voice. I saw this introduction many times. And each time my parents would come on stage, standing tall, walking confidently, chest out, arms extended, and smiling with the majesty of a king and queen. The stage was their castle and the theatre their kingdom. The audience believed they were in for a magnificent journey. And so did my parents. They were ready to perform. It was during these years that I learned the power of words and music in setting the stage for greatness. When my parents listened to the emcee introduce them, they focused on their mission. The words and music they heard centered their attention. They believed in themselves, and they were committed to giving their best performance. All great performers, athletes, and leaders are introduced in a similarly powerful way. The audience and the performer are made to share a powerful narrative that what they are about to experience is going to be spectacular. Over the years I have learned a critical secret to success. I call it The Law of the Narrator. Here it is: The voice that narrates our life determines our success. Our life is not a silent movie. It is one that is narrated every moment of the day. Sometimes our narrator is an emcee, a host, or an announcer. But, most of the time the voice is ours. We are introducing our every activity and narrating our every move consciously and unconsciously. Just think for a moment about today. What have you been saying to yourself? What words have you been using? If you were repeating, Im tired, I dont feel like doing that, or Im worried, you have limited your ability to perform at your best. But if you said instead, Im excited, Im ready, and I can, you have engaged some of your best energy to support you. The bottom line is that The Law of the Narrator is always in play. Throughout each day we have an opportunity to choose our narrators. And we determine what they say and how they say it. When we wake up, see our loved ones, face a challenge, start a project, encounter a problem, work on a task, and see an opportunity, we have a chance to narrate our story in a powerful way. We get to choose the words and soundtrack of our lives. Our mind sets the stage for our performance.
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So, the next time you begin something important in your life, bring out your best narrator. Cue the band, turn on the spotlight, listen to the emcees introduction, hear the audience applaud, and enter in full voice. Its your stage; bring down the house.
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10/29/2010 12:34 PM
Happy News - Are You a Love Cycler or a Clicker?
http://www.happynews.com/news/3272009/love-cycler-clicker.htm
Are You a Love Cycler or a Clicker?

MARCH 27, 2009 David J. Pollay, HappyNews Columnist
Recently Dawn and I were asked two interesting questions. One person asked, Your parents do so much for you guys; why do you think they are so giving? We accepted her question as a compliment and a tribute to our wonderful parents. A couple weeks later, someone asked the second question: You and Dawn do a lot for your parents; how come you do so much for them? We appreciated this question too; it warmly recognized what Dawn and I try to do for our parents. We love our parents very much and want to help make their lives easier and more enjoyable. Until recently, I held these questions separately in my mind; I now see they are part of the same question. Why do we all do so much for each other? The answer is that we are in what I call a Love Cycle. A Love Cycle happens when people in a relationship do not know who started doing what for whom; they only know that there is constant giving and receiving in the relationship. The love expressed and the good works done on each others behalf happen so often that theres no purpose in keeping score. People in a Love Cycle are what I call Love Cyclers. A friend of mine once had a temporary job counting cars at a busy intersection in New York City. He had to click his clicker every time a vehicle of any kind passed by. Although my friend almost lost his mind doing this job, he said he really had to focus so that he could keep clicking. Many people in life walk around with their own clickers counting the number of things that people do for them. These people dont want to give more than they get. They spend valuable time clicking versus cycling the giving in a relationship. They are not Love Cyclers; they are Clickers. So, are you a Love Cycler or a Clicker? Heres the easiest way to orient your thinking to the Love Cycle. Lets take typical marriage vows as an example: to love, honor, and cherish. Clickers sit and wait for their spouses to love, honor, and cherish them. What have you done for me lately? is the question they ask themselves before they reach out to their spouses. Love Cyclers dont wait; they just love, honor, and cherish their spouses. University of Washington psychology researcher, John Gottman, discovered in his research that couples who keep score in their relationships are unhappy in their marriage. Gottman reports in his book, The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work, Happy spouses do not keep tabs on whether their mate is washing dishes as a payback because they cooked dinner. They do it because they generally feel positive about their spouse and their relationship. Good leaders are Love Cyclers. They set the tone at work with their actions. They give, they offer, and they help. They tell stories of people helping them and supporting them. You see them volunteer. On the other hand, Clickers talk about who hasnt helped them, who owes them, and whos giving them a hard time. Clickers are so busy clicking, they are missing the opportunity to give. Three Positive Psychology researchers, Jim Harter, Frank Schmidt, and Corey Keyes, found that, daily occurrences that bring about joy, interest, and love (or caring) lead to a bonding of individuals to each other, their work, and their organization. When managers pay attention and respond to each unique individual they manage, the daily experiences lead to higher frequency of joy, interest, and love (or caring) among their employees.
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Rachael Ray Talks Success with Andrea Goeglein 1-866-975-3777 The bottom line is that Love Cyclers make better spouses, friends, and bosses. So, when you go to work today, and when you go home tonight, think about leaving your clicker behind. Be a Love Cycler. Copyright 2009 by David J. Pollay
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10/29/2010 12:35 PM
Happy News - Share Your Passion
http://www.happynews.com/news/222009/share-passion.htm
Share Your Passion

FEBRUARY 02, 2009 David J. Pollay, HappyNews Columnist
Heres how I like to respond to the question, What are you up to? I say, Im excited about my new television program and Im having a lot of fun writing my weekly newspaper columns. You know, Id love your thoughts on something. I open myself to their feedback and give them a chance to contribute. Then I return the favor and ask them what they are focusing on. I try to engage them. Heidi Goff, former MasterCard Division General Manager once told me, Always come ready with your paperwork to be signed. Her point was that you should believe in your work enough that you are ready for someone to sign on the bottom line at any time. Goffs advice also applies to meeting people. You should be ready to share your passion with others. People may be ready to help you right now. Trust Yourself You must trust yourself to know that you are committed to your dreams; you are sincere in your desire to change your life. Dont get caught up in an inner dialogue that questions your commitment to your passion. It wont help you to repeat, Im not sure if I really want to do this or not, so I better not say anything." You have to trust that your dreams are real. You have to trust that while you might not yet have a plan to make your dreams a reality, you will. Believe in yourself. Trust yourself. Fernando Flores and Robert Solomon in their book Trust wrote, The freedom provided by trust is the freedom to think for oneself and speak up with ones ideas. It includes as its consequence (not its cost) the freedom to be questioned and criticized and the right to be recognized and (if deserving) rewarded. Share Your Dreams My Moms Mom used to say to us, Dont hide your light in a bushel basket. My grandmother wanted us to get out and connect with people. Let them know what youre doing. Let them know whats important to you. Share your dreams. Let people help you.
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10/29/2010 12:36 PM
Happy News - Your Life Metaphor Matters. Listen to 107 year-old C...
http://www.happynews.com/news/222009/life-metaphor-matters-list...
Your Life Metaphor Matters. Listen to 107 year-old Clara.

On the eve of her 107th birthday, I interviewed Clara Font at the adult day care center she visits every day. She was engaging, lucid, and funny. I sat down to talk with her after she had just finished her aerobic exercises with her physical therapist. She had been swinging her legs, and kicking an inflated ball. I was impressed. Sitting face to face with Clara I asked, Tomorrow you turn 107, what do you think? Clara did not hesitate with her answer. She looked right at me, and said with a smile, Life is a gift. In his book "The Happiness Hypothesis," Positive Psychology researcher Jonathan Haidt wrote, Human thinking depends on metaphor. We understand new or complex things in relation to the things we already knowonce you pick a metaphor it will guide your thinking. Consider the power of Claras life is a gift metaphor. When we see life as a gift, we see that it is to be appreciated, unwrapped, shared, cared for, and celebrated. A gift brings delight, opportunity, privilege, and a responsibility to use it thoughtfully. Our metaphors help us make sense of the world. Metaphors allow us to understand something as complex as life by thinking of it in terms of something we already know, like a gift. Claras life is a gift metaphor is all the more impressive to me, considering that her first forty years were marked with tragedy. During the Russian pogroms, two of Claras brothers were ripped from their home and were never seen again. Clara spoke of her family and how they had to separate to survive. As a newlywed, she was forced to leave Russia with her husband. Their perilous journey to Romania began on foot and included swimming across a river. From Romania they traveled to Argentina where their two children were born. In 1939 Clara and her family relocated to the United States to be with her mother and younger sister who had made it safely to New York years earlier. Then one year after arriving in America, her husband died. And through it all, Clara believed that life was a gift. Professors George Lakoff and Mark Johnson wrote in their book, Metaphors We Live By, In all aspects of lifewe define our reality in terms of metaphors and then proceed to act on the basis of the metaphors. We draw inferences, set goals, make commitments, and execute plans, all on the basis of how we in part structure our experience, consciously and unconsciously, by means of metaphor. Years ago you were cool if your metaphor for life was Lifes a b@#!% and then you die. People wore tee-shirts, hats, and put bumper stickers on their cars emblazoned with these words. I always wondered how this metaphor or any of its many variations helped anyone live a better life. Its hard to imagine a centenarian like Clara blowing out her candles, and then shouting, Life sucks! Before the end of my interview with Clara I asked, Clara, whats it like to be almost 107 years old? She smiled broadly, and charmingly told me, Everyone asks me that question. She then leaned forward in her chair and said, Every day is another opportunity.
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10/29/2010 12:37 PM
Happy News - Your Life Metaphor Matters. Listen to 107 year-old C...
http://www.happynews.com/news/222009/life-metaphor-matters-list...
Your Life Metaphor Matters. Listen to 107 year-old Clara.

On the eve of her 107th birthday, I interviewed Clara Font at the adult day care center she visits every day. She was engaging, lucid, and funny. I sat down to talk with her after she had just finished her aerobic exercises with her physical therapist. She had been swinging her legs, and kicking an inflated ball. I was impressed. Sitting face to face with Clara I asked, Tomorrow you turn 107, what do you think? Clara did not hesitate with her answer. She looked right at me, and said with a smile, Life is a gift. In his book "The Happiness Hypothesis," Positive Psychology researcher Jonathan Haidt wrote, Human thinking depends on metaphor. We understand new or complex things in relation to the things we already knowonce you pick a metaphor it will guide your thinking. Consider the power of Claras life is a gift metaphor. When we see life as a gift, we see that it is to be appreciated, unwrapped, shared, cared for, and celebrated. A gift brings delight, opportunity, privilege, and a responsibility to use it thoughtfully. Our metaphors help us make sense of the world. Metaphors allow us to understand something as complex as life by thinking of it in terms of something we already know, like a gift. Claras life is a gift metaphor is all the more impressive to me, considering that her first forty years were marked with tragedy. During the Russian pogroms, two of Claras brothers were ripped from their home and were never seen again. Clara spoke of her family and how they had to separate to survive. As a newlywed, she was forced to leave Russia with her husband. Their perilous journey to Romania began on foot and included swimming across a river. From Romania they traveled to Argentina where their two children were born. In 1939 Clara and her family relocated to the United States to be with her mother and younger sister who had made it safely to New York years earlier. Then one year after arriving in America, her husband died. And through it all, Clara believed that life was a gift. Professors George Lakoff and Mark Johnson wrote in their book, Metaphors We Live By, In all aspects of lifewe define our reality in terms of metaphors and then proceed to act on the basis of the metaphors. We draw inferences, set goals, make commitments, and execute plans, all on the basis of how we in part structure our experience, consciously and unconsciously, by means of metaphor. Years ago you were cool if your metaphor for life was Lifes a b@#!% and then you die. People wore tee-shirts, hats, and put bumper stickers on their cars emblazoned with these words. I always wondered how this metaphor or any of its many variations helped anyone live a better life. Its hard to imagine a centenarian like Clara blowing out her candles, and then shouting, Life sucks! Before the end of my interview with Clara I asked, Clara, whats it like to be almost 107 years old? She smiled broadly, and charmingly told me, Everyone asks me that question. She then leaned forward in her chair and said, Every day is another opportunity.
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10/29/2010 12:41 PM
Happy News - Whats Your Story?! Make it a Good One.
http://www.happynews.com/news/11242008/story-good-one.htm
Whats Your Story?! Make it a Good One.

NOVEMBER 24, 2008 David J. Pollay, HappyNews Columnist
Whats your story?! We used to ask that question when I was growing up in Wisconsin. We didnt know what the question really meant; it was more of an expression. We just wanted to know why people were acting the way they were. More than facts Freshmen year in college I was asked to play a simple game in my Introduction to Psychology class. Professor Judith Rodin, future president of the University of Pennsylvania, asked us to be an eye-witness to a staged event, and afterwards describe what we saw. You could guess the results. Our descriptions of the same event differed from student to student, sometimes dramatically. The facts were not as obvious as we thought they would be. Our life is not just a series of facts. It is mostly a set of interpretations we have made about events in our life. These interpretations add up to a story a story of who we think we are, what we have experienced, and what were likely to do in the future. An adventure story Last semester I went with my Mom to an art history class at Florida Atlantic University. The room was packed to hear professor David Courtney. His message that day was captured in his question to the class, Are you taking an adventure every day of your life? He challenged us to immerse ourselves in something we love, something that challenges us every day. Each day is an opportunity to build our positive life story. Our story guides our actions; it is the link to realizing our best possible life. A limiting story Years ago I was sitting in a conference room with one of my employees. He had once again offended a customer and half my department. I was trying to help him realize that his approach to communication was not helping our business, and it wasnt helping him. And then in a moment of frustration he yelled out proudly, My way has gotten me this far! I paused. I looked at him. I felt sad. He was right. He wanted to be a director, yet he was a second level customer service representative. His way his story was not working. Dan McAdams, professor of Psychology at Northwestern University, refers to our stories as our personal myths. McAdams said in his book The Stories We Live By, If you feel that your myth is stagnant, if you sense that you are not moving forward in life with purpose, if you believe that you are falling behind in some sense with respect to the growth of your personal identity, then what you are looking for is developmental change in personal myth. In other words, you need to change your story. A story of opportunity I recently called Ray Fowler, former CEO of the American Psychological Association; I was considering a significant opportunity in my life and I wanted his advice. Fowler told me, For forty years my philosophy has been, if youre presented with an outrageous opportunity, take it. I have never regretted doing something; I have only regretted not doing something. Consider Fowlers advice. Consider Courtneys advice. Make your life story about adventure, meaning, and growth.
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10/29/2010 12:42 PM
Happy News - Be A Day-Starter
http://www.happynews.com/news/10132008/day-starter.htm
Be A Day-Starter
My wife, Dawn, usually wakes up before I do. Sometimes she wakes up by alarm, and other times by the gentle tugging of one of our two little girls, Eliana (5) and Ariela (4). Then around 6:30a.m., its my turn. This is how I wake up: Dawn hugs me and whispers good morning until I open my eyes. Its a beautiful way to begin a day; I am loved awake. Dawn starts my day. And then I continue the cycle. I step out of bed and head upstairs to my little girls rooms. I quietly walk into their bedrooms and wake them up with a big hug. It is one of my favorite parts of the day. I start their day. When everyone is dressed, they meet me in the kitchen. Each morning I make a fruit shake for Dawn and the girls. The girls drink their shakes while I make little bowls of oatmeal for them. When they finish their shakes, they let me know. Why? Because they know whats coming: The Happy Dance! They giggle as I jump up and down like an excited little kid (we do this whenever something good happens in the family). They love my energy and the attention I give them. And finally, when its time for the girls to go to school (7:15a.m.), I run alongside Dawns car waving, smiling, and trying to make them laugh. We have fun in the morning. I help start their day. I see it as my mission to help my family start their day in the best possible way. I want them to be in a mood to enjoy everything good that will come to them that day, and to be able to handle any challenges that might also arise. I see my role as a Day-Starter as an opportunity to make a positive difference in the lives of the people I love. How do you wake up in the morning? What is your first interaction of the day? What do you do and say to help the ones you love in the morning? Be A Day-Starter in Your Family If youre not already beginning your day as warmly and positively as you could, be a Day-Starter for one week: When you wake up in the morning, express your love with your words and your actions. If you normally complain right after you get up, express your love first. If you have to begin your day with a cup of coffee in the morning, do it after you have hugged and kissed everyone. And if you dont normally hug and kiss your family, start now and let me know what impact it has on your life when you do. Suspend your normal wake-up habits for one week. Be a Day-Starter at home. Be A Day-Starter with Your Roommates If you live with roommates, be the first to greet everyone. Be the first to smile. Make the coffee. Offer to make their breakfast when you make yours. Demonstrate your interest in them. Start their day. Be A Day-Starter if You Live Alone And if you live alone, call someone you care about. Email a kind note to a friend. Exercise with friends, or grab a cup of coffee with them. Start someones day. Invite Your Family and Friends to Join You And if you want your family or friends to join you on your journey as a Day-Starter, send this column to them. Have a great week, and let me know how it goes.
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10/29/2010 12:42 PM
Happy News - Women with Belief Series: Notes from an Opera Si...
http://www.happynews.com/news/1012008/women-belief-series-not...
Women with Belief Series: Notes from an Opera Singer

Mom was an opera singer who could sing high Cs beautifully. And she had the chance to sing them often. Mom was a leading soprano with The National Opera Company, and with The Community Concert Series of Columbia Artists after her undergraduate and graduate studies at the New England Conservatory of Music. Her repertoire included Verdi, Puccini, Mozart, Gounod, Massenet, Hayden, and Handel. Mom also toured Europe for the State Department to entertain our troops. And in 1956 she was presented with a certificate of esteem signed by the United States Secretary of Defense, C.E. Wilson, for patriotic service in providing entertainment to members of the armed forces in Europe. I asked Mom recently how she was able to consistently sing a high C. She said, You already have to believe its there. And once you believe it is, you have to find a way to let all negative thoughts go so that you can sing your high C. Daniel J. Wakin wrote about the high C last year in his article, The Note that Makes Us Weep. Wakin quotes Craig Rutenberg, The Metropolitan Operas director of musical administration, It is the absolute summit of technique. More than anywhere else in your voice, you have to know what youre doing. To me it signals a self-confidence in the singer that lets him communicate to us that he knows what hes doing and he has something very important to express with that note. When I was growing up in Milwaukee, my parents formed their own singing act, The Pollays. They performed across the United States and Canada with stars like Joey Bishop, Shecky Green, Myron Cohen, Mark Russell, Morey Amsterdam, Rich Little, and David Brenner. My brother and I often had the opportunity to travel with them. I remember one particular performance. Mom had the flu. And just minutes before being introduced on stage, Mom was throwing up in the bathroom. I asked Mom how she was able to sing that day. She said, I always had a belief that I could sing under almost any circumstances. No matter how sick I was, if I could stand up, then I could sing. Mom continued, You believe you can do it. You practice every day. You know you have the technique. You just have to concentrate and believe it is in you. And not only did she make it through the show, Mom and Dad received a standing ovation. In a chapter on self-efficacy beliefs for the Handbook of Positive Psychology, James Maddux, professor of Psychology at George Mason University wrote, The truth is that believing that you can accomplish what you want to accomplish is one of the most important ingredients perhaps the most important ingredient in the recipe for success. How did a girl from Augusta, Maine become an opera singer? Mom said, My belief was that I could sing and that everyone wanted to hear me sing from the time I was three years old. My mother used to say that I woke up singing with the birds before anyone else in the family was upand I sang all day. There was always singing in my home, said Mom. On Sunday nights we listened to the Firestone Hour. We heard opera, operetta, and other beautiful music. I dreamed and I believed that I could sing as well as the stars could and that some day I would sing opera and be well-known. I bought sheet music and imitated all those famous singers, and the singers in the movies.
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Mom turned her talent and her interest into a successful singing career that spanned five decades and took her around the world. Moms beliefs gave her the drive and courage to accomplish something very few people do. She became a professional singer. She sang opera. And she could sing the high Cs.
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10/29/2010 12:43 PM
Happy News - A Gratitude Moment: The Letter
http://www.happynews.com/news/7282008/gratitude-moment-letter.htm
A Gratitude Moment: The Letter

JULY 28, 2008 David J. Pollay, HappyNews Columnist
I checked on Dawn and the girls. Dawn was sleeping. And Eliana and Ariela were sprawled across our bed fast asleep. We let them stay up a little later than usual (sometimes we let them fall asleep on our bed, and then I carry them upstairs to their rooms). As I was heading from our bedroom to the kitchen, I stopped in the foyer to look at two pieces of mail that were opened and sitting on a shelf. I reached for the one on top. It was a letter. It was addressed to Dawn. I read the first two lines. Thank you for your recent visit to our facility. Your digital mammogram shows no evidence of cancer. I stopped. I didnt read the rest of the letter. I just thought about what it could have said. And then I thought about all the other letters that were opened today, and the letters that would be opened tomorrow. Many thousands of women would be blessed with good news. I also thought about all the women around the world who had received or will receive the news they fear most. Then I had what I call a gratitude moment. I headed to a window. I looked outside and took in the big world. And I said thank you. Thank you for blessing the health of my wife, children, parents, and all of my family. Thank you for caring for my friends and colleagues. And I said thank you for everything that is good in my life. I know letters and phone calls could come at any time with news I would never want to hear. So, when I am reminded of the good in my life, I stop and say thank you. I want to always appreciate the abundance in my life. The science of positive psychology now points us to the psychological and physical benefits of feeling grateful. Robert Emmons of the University of California at Davis and Michael McCollough of the University of Miami found in their research published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology: There do appear to exist benefits to regularly focusing on ones blessings. The advantages are most pronounced when compared with a focus on hassles or complaints In one study Emmons and McCollough found that a weekly benefit listing was associated with more positive and optimistic appraisals of ones life, more time spent exercising, and fewer reported physical symptoms. In another study they discovered: People led to focus on their blessings were also more likely to report having helped someone with a personal problem or offered emotional support to another And in one more study the research pair found that people induced to feel gratitude experienced greater levels of positive affect, more sleep, better sleep quality, and greater optimism and a sense of connectedness to others. The evidence is in: Gratitude pays dividends to all who practice it. So, would you join me this week on a special journey? This week look for the reminders of the good in your life. And when you find them, stop and say thanks. You have much to celebrate in your life.
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10/29/2010 12:43 PM
Happy News - Live Like a Mockingbird: Fight for What You Care Ab...
http://www.happynews.com/news/7202008/live-mockingbird-fight-c...
Live Like a Mockingbird: Fight for What You Care About

JULY 20, 2008 David J. Pollay, HappyNews Columnist
My office door opens to a small courtyard; I have to walk across it to get to our kitchen. Lining my walk is a small stand of Bamboo trees to my left and a fountain to my right. Heres what happened today. As I was making my way across the courtyard, something hit me on the left shoulder. And it made a squeak on impact. I jumped and quickly looked around. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a small bird flying away from me and onto the roof of the building. I smiled and figured that the bird and I had accidentally collided. I thought nothing more of it and went into the kitchen, filled my glass with water, and went back out into the courtyard. And then boom I was hit again! But this time I took it on the right shoulder. I looked up and saw a Mockingbird fly away and land back on the roof. Right then I knew what was happening. This bird was protecting its nest. Think about this. Mockingbirds weigh approximately 1.7 ounces (50 grams). On a good day, I weigh about 180 lbs. (78 kilos). The length of a Mockingbird is 9 inches (23 centimeters). Standing tall, I am 72 inches (about 1.8 meters). The Mockingbird is clearly outmatched. Yet, this fact does not stop it from doing what it has to do to protect its nest. When I returned to my office and sat down, I thought: What is my nest in life? What is so important to me that I would fly in the face of adversity to care for it? So, I ask the same question of you: What is your nest in life? Who do you protect? What do you care about? What do you value? Your first answer to this question is probably your family, your closest friends, or someone in physical danger; you would do anything you could for these people. Heres the harder question to answer: What else is in your nest? What else in your life are you willing to protect with such commitment and passion? What about your career? What about your dreams? How committed are you to them? What happens when you are told that you are not good enough to be a doctor, lawyer, writer, speaker, or whatever profession you are pursuing? What happens when people dont immediately help you, or buy from you, or like your work? Do you stick with it, or do you give up? The reality of life is that sometimes our goals feel unachievable; the path we must follow from where we are to where we want to go just seems too hard and too far to travel. And despite the claims of some people, good things do not come to us just because we wish them into our lives. Peter Drucker, one of the 20th centurys best known business thinkers said, Unless commitment is made, there are only promises and hopes...but no plans. We have to believe deeply in why we want something, make the decision to pursue it, and then get out in the world and take action. And then, we have to stay the course when forces align against us. We have to know whats worth fighting for in our lives. We have to know when failure is not an option, and success is our only choice. And then we have to muster the courage to do what we have to do.
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10/29/2010 12:44 PM
Happy News - Don't Let the Peanuts Run Your Life
http://www.happynews.com/news/5232008/don-let-peanuts-run-life.htm
Don't Let the Peanuts Run Your Life

MAY 23, 2008 David J. Pollay, HappyNews Columnist
I love peanuts. I like them salted or unsalted. I like them sweet or savory. You can put them in my dinner or in my dessert. I never met a peanut I didnt like. It is a joy to eat peanuts! Its also a challenge to eat peanuts. Peanuts pack a caloric punch. Too many peanuts per day and you have to loosen your belt. One day I decided to reduce my peanut intake. I resolved not to eat peanuts after dinner, or for a late night snack. So, the next night I had dinner. And sure enough, I had a thought to eat some peanuts. But I reminded myself that I had decided not to eat peanuts. So I did not eat peanuts. And then it happened. An hour later I was standing in my kitchen with salt on my lips, peanuts in my mouth, and another load ready to go. But, I did not remember opening the cabinet, reaching down to the bottom shelf, grabbing the peanut jar okay, the peanut tub and putting a handful of delicious peanuts in my mouth. It was only after I stuck my hand in the tub of peanuts a second time I thought, Whoa! Whoa! Whoa! How did this happen? How did I end up here?! Psychology researcher Jonathan Haidt of the University of Virginia explains this phenomenon with a metaphor he calls the Rider and the Elephant. In his book The Happiness Hypothesis, and in his earlier research papers, Haidt described how the rider is our conscious mind, and the elephant is our unconscious mind. We are constantly trying to guide our body and thoughts in the direction we want them to go. The challenge is, as Haidts metaphor illustrates, when an elephant is determined to go somewhere, it will, rider in tow. Now take my peanut example to another level. What if you want to change something important in your life? If you decide that you are going to do something differently, but you are not aware of what is happening below the surface, in your unconscious, how will you succeed? The answer is you wont. Haidt warns, The rider cant just decide to change and then order the elephant to go along with the program. Lasting change can come only by retraining the elephant, and thats hard to do. The key to achieving new and important things in your life is to find out what is unconsciously limiting you and then replace it with a belief that will enable your success. Your most potent levers of sustainable change are your beliefs. Uncover your beliefs and you will find out why you do what you do. You will learn more about your elephant. So heres one approach to drawing out your beliefs. Start by identifying an important and big goal in your life and how soon you would like to reach it. Make sure this goal would change your life dramatically if you achieved it. Now grab a pen and answer these questions. What will I gain if I achieve my goal? What will I have to do to accomplish my goal? What will I have to give up to reach my goal? What will happen if I fail to meet my goal? Start each of your answers with I believe I to help elicit your beliefs. Now look at your answers. These are some of the beliefs you hold relative to your goal. The question, then, is which of these beliefs will help you achieve your goal and which ones will hold you back. Your success in life depends on your ability to uncover and change your limiting beliefs to those that will fire you up and bring out your greatness.
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10/29/2010 12:45 PM
Happy News - Baby Crying on a Plane? Turn a Negative to a Positive http://www.happynews.com/news/5142008/baby-crying-plane-turn-n...
Baby Crying on a Plane? Turn a Negative to a Positive

MAY 14, 2008 David J. Pollay, HappyNews Columnist
The plane was full. My seat was 22C. To my surprise there was no one beside me and no one behind me. I felt like I had won the lottery of airplane seating. You know the feeling. You can spread out. You can recline without bothering anyone. You can even use two tray tables! I was flying to Chicago to present one of my corporate seminars. I needed to concentrate on reviewing my program. The peace and quiet would be great. I immediately opened my bag and began to work. The flight attendants were readying the plane for takeoff when it happened. Youre in 23C, I heard a flight attendant say. And just as I looked up I heard the increasingly loud cries of a baby. A mother and her upset baby girl were coming my way. Right behind me was the seat 23C. Five minutes later the babys cry turned into a wail and her little legs were kicking my seat. I couldn't work with such distraction. There were no answers to my questions: Why does the little girl have to kick my seat? Isnt there a way to stop the baby from crying? And why of all places on the plane do they have to sit right behind me!? I started searching for what I could say, or what I should do. There was nowhere for me to go. When Your Road Turns Negative Create a Fork in Your Path Then I smiled. I realized I actually had a choice. I could either see the situation as a dead-end negative, or I could see the situation in another way. I could find another road out and take it. And I did. In that moment I found another way to look at the situation. I now call it my fork. I thought of my own children. I started to laugh when I thought that Eliana, 4, and Ariela, 3, had done their share of crying and seat-kicking in airplanes, as hard as we tried to stop it! So I turned the babys crying and seat-kicking into a reminder that I have two wonderful little girls of my own. Each time the little girl cried or kicked my seat, I felt grateful for my daughters. Sure I would have preferred the flight to be quieter, but guess what? I was able to work because I became quieter inside. I replaced the negative emotion I was feeling with gratitude for my own children. Psychologist Barbara Frederickson at the University of North Carolina observed how inducing positive emotions in people following a negative experience loosens the vice grip that the negative event holds psychologically. She also found that people bounced back faster physiologically their cardiovascular activity slowed. When we landed in Chicago I stood up and turned to look at the mother and her child. She smiled a little nervously at me and started to apologize for her daughters crying. I stopped her. I pulled out my wallet, opened it, and handed it to her. I pointed to the picture of my two little red-headed daughters. I said, These are my little girls. Theyre wonderful. And they cry too. Your daughter is beautiful. Congratulations. She smiled and said, Thank you. I smiled and left the plane feeling good (something I wouldn't have thought possible when the crying and kicking began).
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10/29/2010 12:46 PM
Happy News - Build Your Business with Gratitude Chains - Part III
http://www.happynews.com/columns/david-j-pollay/2282008/build-...
Build Your Business with Gratitude Chains - Part III

The third in a three-part series on building gratitude in your life and business. Our three-part series on gratitude has focused on building Gratitude Chains in your life to increase your happiness. Today were going to focus on how you can create Gratitude Chains to support your business. Remember you create Gratitude Chains in your life when you cultivate three things: (1) Awareness of what and for whom you are grateful, (2) Curiosity about what they do that makes you feel grateful, or what makes something you value possible, and (3) Memory of what is good about these individuals or things by engaging in gratitude practices. I interviewed Arthur J. Kobacker earlier this year in his home. Art was 83 when he passed away on July 12, 2007. Art was a philanthropist with his wife Sara Jo. One of Arts most personally rewarding endeavors involved providing the initial funding (and supplemental annual funds) to build and support The Village Academy, a K-12 school in the heart of Delray Beach, Floridas inner city. Art was also a successful businessman who sold his Kobacker Shoe Company (679 stores in 31 states) in 1994 to Payless ShoeSource Inc. In our two hour interview Art shared some of his experiences in business and in life. Art believed in the importance of building Gratitude Chains in business (although he used his own words to describe the idea). He believed that successful business leaders should always connect directly with their customers and their employees. So lets look at a Gratitude Chain focused on business. And well include Arts insights to illustrate each part of the Gratitude Chain building process. Step 1: Cultivate Awareness Spend time in your stores. Visit your customer service centers. Art told me about a time when an international group of businessmen arrived for a week-long visit with him, but they arrived on the wrong week. And Art was out of town visiting a store. So Arts office called his wife Sara Jo to ask if she knew where he was. Art said, I remember my wife started calling storesand she reached the store in Portsmouth, Virginia, talked to a very nice store manager, and she said, Is Mr. Kobacker there?" And he said, "No, hes not." "And had he been there?" "No." "Is he expected?" And this manager said, "He is always expected. Step 2: Cultivate Curiosity Ask your customers what they value. Ask them what they like best about your products and services. Ask them what they would like you to improve. Talk to your employees. Ask them how they best take care of your customers. Ask them what helps them support your customers the most, and what makes it hard for them to do their job. Art said to me, If you ask the right questions, you get the right answers, and you find out where you are making mistakes and where you are doing things that are right, and you might expand on them. And I just learned a whole lot from doing that. Visiting stores, meeting with people, and the store employees, and the store manager, and talking to customers were the high points of my retail experience.
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10/29/2010 12:46 PM
Happy News - Appreciate Your Loved Ones with A Gratitude Chain...
http://www.happynews.com/columns/david-j-pollay/2122008/apprec...
Appreciate Your Loved Ones with A Gratitude Chain Part II

The second in a three-part series on building gratitude in your life. Last week I told you that when you increase your gratitude in life, you become happier and more successful. And I shared with you that one way to amplify your gratitude is to build Gratitude Chains. You cultivate three things in the process of building a Gratitude Chain: (1) Awareness of what and for whom you are grateful, (2) Curiosity about what they do that makes you grateful, or what makes something you value possible, and (3) Memory of what is good about these individuals or things by engaging in gratitude practices. And when you link together your Gratitude Chains, you experience a powerful appreciation of the important people and things in your life. So lets look at a Gratitude Chain applied to your personal life. You can start with your spouse, your boyfriend or girlfriend, or a friend. If you do not fully appreciate what they do and how they do it every day, step into their world. Heres an example of a Gratitude Chain I created for my wife Dawn. Step 1: Cultivate Awareness My wife Dawn drives our daughters, Eliana (5) and Ariela (4), thirty-forty minutes each way to school, Monday through Friday. She often has to make two round-trips because the girls get out of school at different times. My girls receive the education we want for them because Dawn makes the drive every day. I did not truly experience gratitude for what she does until I made the trip a number of times myself. I became aware. I also did not fully understand the demands of a mothers role until I spent entire days, morning until bedtime, with the girls. My gratitude increased when I realized how much love, patience, and stamina Dawn shows every day. In fact, I have an appreciation for all moms. I became aware. Step 2: Cultivate Curiosity I asked Dawn how she manages every morning to bathe, dress, feed, brush hair, put on sunscreen, make lunches, fill backpacks, and put on shoes for the girls so quickly. I wanted to know her secret (because truthfully, it takes me twice as long to do the same thing). I asked about her system for accomplishing everything. I learned the steps, but more importantly, I learned how much love, care and thought Dawn puts into each day with the girls. I became curious. Step 3: Cultivate Memory Every morning when I wake up I start my day by reciting everything I am grateful for, and Dawn is at the top of my list. My morning gratitude ritual helps me keep fresh in my mind all that Dawn does for our family each day. And I look for opportunities to recognize Dawn, big and small. One of my practices is to write her a note each day. My notes congratulate or thank her. And they always say that I love her. I commit my gratitude to memory by practicing gratitude everyday. I remember. Link Your Gratitude Chains Together Gratitude Chains help to embed in your subconscious positive thoughts and feelings about who and what you care about; they keep your mind focused on recognizing everyone and everything important to you. And the more Gratitude Chains you have, the more you have the opportunity to influence your happiness.
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10/29/2010 12:49 PM
North Star Writers Group
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March 26, 2007 Share Your Dreams; Let People Help You Have you ever said something like this to yourself? I have a dream. I want to do what I love every day. Yet, I dont know how to get there. I have too many responsibilities right now. I am too busy. When things slow down, Ill figure out what to do. Most of us are affected by this thinking at some point in time. We keep our dreams locked up inside. We wait for another day. Its time to break this cycle of thinking. Stop limiting yourself. Let other people help you think about how you can achieve your dreams. Call in their mind power. Consider this. Youre at a party and someone says, What are you up to? How would you respond? Most of the time I hear people fumble through their answers. They say things like, Not much. Business is good. Familys good. How about you? Why waste time boring yourself and others with answers like these. Skip that stuff. Let other people share in your passion. Ask for their ideas and advice. Most people will feel closer to you as a result. And those who show no interest in your passion are better left alone. Theres no need to spend much time with people who do not care about what matters to you. People who report high levels of commitment and involvement in their goals show a high level of well-being and low distress, reported psychology researchers Jari-Erik Nurmi and Katariina Salmela-Aro in a chapter they wrote in A Life Worth Living by Mihaly and Isabella Csikszentmihalyi. Heres how I like to respond to the what are you up to? question. I say, Im having fun writing my columns and working on a book. Ive been learning a ton and meeting lots of fascinating people. You know, Id love your thoughts on something. I open myself to their feedback and give them a chance to contribute. Then I return the favor and ask them what they are focusing on. I try to engage them. Heidi Goff, former MasterCard Division General Manager, once told me, Always come ready with your paperwork to be signed. Her point was that you should believe in your work enough that you are ready for someone to sign on the bottom line at any time. Goffs advice applies to meeting people. You should be ready to share your passion with others. People may be ready to help you right now. You must trust yourself to know that you are committed to your dreams, that you are sincere in your desire to change your life. Dont get caught up in an inner dialogue that questions your commitment to your passion. It wont help you to repeat, Im not sure if I really want to do this or not, so I better not say anything. You have to trust that your dreams are real. You have to trust that while you might not yet have a plan to make your dreams a reality, you will. You believe in yourself. You have self-trust. Fernando Flores and Robert Solomon, in their book Trust, wrote, The freedom provided by trust is the freedom to think for oneself and speak up with ones ideas. It includes as its consequence (not its cost) the freedom to be questioned and criticized and the right to be recognized and (if deserving) rewarded. My moms mom used to say to us, Dont hide your light in a bushel basket. My grandmother wanted us to get out and connect with people. Let them know what youre doing. Let them know whats important to you. Share your dreams. Let people help you.
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10/29/2010 12:54 PM
April 2, 2007 Get Back in Training and Youll Learn More Three weeks ago I was shopping in an office supply store. I stepped up to the check-out counter when it was my turn to pay. The clerk behind the cash register was wearing a name badge that said Dane. And below his name read In Training. I said, Dane, hows your training going? He stopped. He looked to his left. He looked to his right. Then he leaned into me and said, Im not actually in training anymore. I started laughing! What? I said. Then why are you wearing a badge that says In Training? Heres what he said: When I was in training I learned a lot more, and people were friendlier to me. As I left the store and slowly walked out to my car I thought Hes right. You do learn more and people are friendlier to you when youre in training. Heres why. When you declare to the world that you are in training and that you want to learn, you become a student. And when you tell the world that you are a student, people want to help you. They want to teach you. You are essentially telling other people that they have strengths, knowledge, skills and experience that you believe are valuable and that you appreciate. Let me check something out with you. Pretend for a moment that your child, or your spouse, or your employee says this to you, I would like to learn from you. It would mean a lot if you would help me. How would you feel? My bet is that you feel good right now just thinking about it. We all like to think we have something to offer our children, our husband or wife and our employees. People are friendlier to us when we are humble enough to ask for help. We are also demonstrating our curiosity when we seek assistance. We are telegraphing to the world that we are on a search for new ways to do, see or experience things. In their book Character Strengths and Virtues, leading Positive Psychologists Martin Seligman and Christopher Peterson point to research that shows that when people demonstrate curiosity, people learn more, are more engaged and perform better academically and at work. Curiosity leads to better performance. So now I think of Dane when I catch myself acting as if I know something. Rather than prove what I know to everyone, I listen and try to see what else I can learn. All this reminds me of my first bus trip from LaGuardia Airport to Manhattan, 22 years ago. I hopped on the bus and took my seat. I then turned to someone across the aisle and said, Hi. I dont know my way around here. Do you know how to get to Madison Square Garden from this bus line? I still laugh when I think about what happened next. The person across from me immediately started giving me directions. And then not one, not two, but three other people started sharing their best way to get to Madison Square Garden. They all wanted to help! And that felt great! People want to help people who want to learn. So now I say to myself when I head out from home, David, are you wearing your badge today? How about you? What does your badge say?
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10/29/2010 12:55 PM
Whats Your Story? Make It a Good One
Whats your story? We used to ask this question when I was growing up in Wisconsin. We didnt know what the question really meant; it was more of an expression. We just wanted to know why someone was acting the way they were. Freshman year in college, I was asked to play a simple game in my Introduction to Psychology class. Professor Judith Rodin, future president of the University of Pennsylvania, asked us to be an eyewitness to a staged event, and then describe what we saw afterwards. You could guess the results. Our descriptions of the same event were different student to student, sometimes dramatically. The facts were not as obvious as we thought they would be. Our life is not a series of facts only. It is mostly a set of interpretations we have made about events in our life. These interpretations add up to a theme. This theme is expanded into a story, a story of who we think we are, what we have experienced and what were likely to choose in the future. On the first day of my graduate education in Applied Positive Psychology, guest lecturer and former CEO of the American Psychological Association, Ray Fowler, asked us to share with him our life theme. Fowler explained that our life theme is played out in almost everything we do. When you understand your theme, you better understand the successes and challenges of your life. Fowlers life theme idea is a powerful place to start when designing your life. Your historical path is a good predictor of your future trajectory. Years ago, I was sitting in a conference room with one of my employees. He had once again offended a customer and half my department. I was trying to help him realize that his brash approach to communication was not helping our business, and it wasnt helping him. And then in a moment of frustration he yelled out proudly, My way has gotten me this far! I paused. I looked at him. I felt sad. He was right. He wanted to be a director, yet he was a second level customer service representative. His story was not working. Dan McAdams, professor of Psychology at Northwestern University, refers to our stories as our personal myths. McAdams said in his book The Stories We Live By, If you feel that your myth is stagnant, if you sense that you are not moving forward in life with purpose, if you believe that you are falling behind in some sense with respect to the growth of your personal identity, then what you are looking for is developmental change in personal myth. Last month, I went with my mom to an art history class at Florida Atlantic University. The room was packed to hear Professor David Courtney. His message that day was captured in his question to the class, Are you taking an adventure every day of your life? He wanted us to immerse ourselves in something we love, something that challenges us every day. Each day is an opportunity to build our positive life story. Our story guides our actions; it is the link to realizing our best possible life. I recently called Ray Fowler; I was considering a significant opportunity in my life and I wanted his advice. Fowler told me, For 40 years my philosophy has been, if youre presented with an outrageous opportunity, take it. I have never regretted doing something. I have only regretted not doing something. Consider Fowlers advice. Consider Courtneys advice. Make your life story about adventure, meaning and growth. So, whats your story?
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10/29/2010 12:56 PM
Long Life is Good; Good Life is Better I used to do it every time I went to an art museum. I would view a painting that I liked, and then I would head for the wall directly to the right of it. Now I was careful not to disturb anyones view on my approach, so I would make a big swing to the right and then shimmy up the wall until I reached the little metal plaque next to the painting. Sure, I was interested in the name of the painting, who painted it and the year in which it was completed. But I mostly wanted to know one thing. I wanted to know how long the artist lived. I was always relieved and happy when I saw that the artist had lived a long life, and I was disappointed when I saw it had been a short one. For as long as I can remember, I thought a good life was a long life. Positive Psychology helped change my thinking. Psychologists Martin Seligman and Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi co-founded Positive Psychology when Seligman was president of the American Psychological Association in 1998. Seligman was celebrated for his research on learned helplessness and learned optimism, while Csikszentmihalyi was best known for his research on flow, and for his best-selling book by the same name. Both men set psychology on a course to discover what made people happy and thrive in life. They wanted to know what made up the good life. The results of countless research studies that followed the launch of Positive Psychology led Seligman to conclude that there were three approaches to the good life. And they were all important. When you savor the present, are grateful for the past, and are hopeful for the future, you are experiencing positive emotion, the first component of happiness. When you do what you do best, when you use your signature strengths in your lifes work, you are engaged. This is the second contributor to happiness. And when you are involved in activities that are beyond your self-interest activities that you believe matter to the world you are experiencing the third and final component of the good life. Your life is full of meaning. While genetics do play a role in affecting our happiness, Sonja Lyubomirskys research has demonstrated that as much as 50 percent of our happiness is within our direct control. The headline here is that the good life is possible. Its within our grasp, and it is not measured only by the number of years we live. My little girls helped me learn this lesson last year. Dawn and I took Eliana and Ariela, three and two at the time, to a museum of butterflies in Key West. When we entered the museum through a special pressurized entrance, we were immediately surrounded by thousands of butterflies, all flapping their multi-colored wings. My girls were thrilled! I turned to our museum guide and asked, How long do butterflies live? She said, About 10 days. I thought to myself, Ten days - what do you do in 10 days? So I blurted out, What do they do in ten days? And she stopped, paused, and said, They make the world a more beautiful place. Every day I now ask myself, How am I making the world a more beautiful place? A long life is good; a good life is better.
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10/29/2010 12:56 PM
Are You a Love Cycler or a Clicker? Recently my wife Dawn and I were asked two interesting questions. One person asked us, Your parents do so much for you guys, why do you think they are so giving? We accepted her question as a great compliment and tribute to the wonderful people that our parents are. A couple weeks later, someone asked the second question: You and Dawn give so much to your parents, how come you do so much for them? We appreciated this question too. It warmly recognized what Dawn and I try to do for our parents. We love them very much and want to help make their lives easier and more enjoyable. Until recently I held these questions separately in my mind. I now see they are part of the same question. Why do we all do so much for each other? The answer is that we are in what I call a Love Cycle. A Love Cycle happens when people in a relationship do not know who started doing what for whom. They only know that there is constant giving and receiving in the relationship. The love expressed and the good works done on each others behalf happen so often that theres no purpose in keeping score. People in a Love Cycle are what I call Love Cyclers. A friend of mine once had a temporary job counting cars at a busy intersection. He had to click his clicker every time a vehicle of any kind went driving by. Although my friend almost lost his mind doing this job, he said he really had to focus so that he could keep clicking his clicker. Many people in life walk around with their own clickers counting the number of things that people do for them. These people dont want to give more than they get. They click because they do not trust. They spend valuable time clicking, versus cycling the giving in a relationship. They are not Love Cyclers. They are Clickers. So are you a Love Cycler or a Clicker? Heres the easiest way to reorient your thinking to the Love Cycle. Lets take typical marriage vows as an example to love, honor and cherish. Clickers sit and wait for their spouse to love, honor and cherish them. What have you done for me lately? is the question they ask themselves before they reach out to their spouse. Love Cyclers dont wait. They just love, honor and cherish their spouses. Good leaders are Love Cyclers. They set the tone at work with their actions. They give, they help, they offer. They tell stories of people helping them and supporting them. You see them volunteer. On the other hand, Clickers talk about who hasnt helped them, who owes them, whos giving them a hard time and who they dont like. The bottom line is that Clickers are so busy clicking, they are not loving. Jim Harter, Frank Schmidt, and Corey Keyes, three Positive Psychology researchers found that daily occurrences that bring about joy, interest and love (or caring) lead to a bonding of individuals to each other, their work and their organization. When managers pay attention and respond to each unique individual they manage, the daily experiences lead to higher frequency of joy, interest and love (or caring) among their employees. The bottom line is that Love Cyclers make better bosses and better spouses. So when you go to work today, and when you go home tonight, think about leaving your clicker behind and be a Love Cycler.
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10/29/2010 12:57 PM
Give Up the Game Show Mindset and Improve Your Relationships I was a senior in High School. I was in class and my teacher was asking us questions. She would ask a question and we would raise our hands if we knew the answer. After three questions no one could miss that there was a student in the back row bouncing out of his seat trying to answer every question. The problem was that he was probably not even aware that he was crowding out other peoples contributions. He was so concerned with grabbing every opportunity to show how smart he was that he took his eyes completely off his relationship with others. I call this the Game Show Mindset. The Game Show Mindset is all about being right. You love being right and you jump on opportunities to show what you know. You couldnt care less if the other guy scores a point. In fact, in your view, his points scored are the ones you lost. People with the Game Show Mindset travel around with a huge, invisible answer button. They stand ready to press it at any time. I call them Game Show Contestants. And like a scary movie, Game Show Contestants are everywhere! Do you know what Game Show Contestant Managers look like at work? Every time they ask a question, they preface it with everything they know on the subject. They want credit for their knowledge before they turn the floor over to someone else. If anyone then responds with an answer that they think they should know, they interrupt by saying things like, Yeah, exactly thats right, but what about such and such? Game Show Contestant Managers are like Hoover vacuums. They suck up all the opportunities to shine. This Game Show behavior happens at home too. I should know. I was caught with my hand on the answer button last week. I wanted so much to be right, that I rained on my wifes parade. Dawn had rearranged a few rooms in our home over the weekend while I was away in New York leading a workshop (probably a good strategy when you read below). She did a beautiful job in the house and worked very hard. I was impressed and she was rightly proud of herself. The day after I returned from my trip she started to apply her talent to the upstairs office. And then I played the role of the Game Show Contestant. I said things like, That wont fit, I already measured it, and That doesnt look good if its not centered. And then I carried my big answer button to the kitchen and started in again, That snack is not as healthy as you think, and blah, blah, blah. Like my high school friend I got so caught up in being right, I missed the chance to be supportive and encouraging. Relationship researcher John Gottman would say that I was so focused on being right, I missed what he calls bids. He says in his book, The Relationship Cure, A bid can be a question, a gesture, a look, a touch any single expression that says, I want to feel connected to you. Gottmans research shows that most relationships succeed because of the many small interactions people have. He says: By becoming aware and mindful of such moments, we can give and receive the intimacy and support we all need from our closest relationships. Take Gottmans guidance: Pay attention to your relationships. You can take your hand off the answer button. Theres no need to jump out of your seat to answer every question. Forget about racking up points on the imaginary scoreboard. The rewards are much greater when you do.
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10/29/2010 12:58 PM
Be Like Michelangelo. See the Best in Yourself and Others I want to be like Michelangelo. I had the chance to travel to Italy 16 years ago. Florence was one of the stops on my trip. It was one of the most beautiful cities I had ever seen. One day I visited the Michelangelo Museum. I was excited to see one of the most famous statues in the world, Michelangelos David. I walked through the front door of the museum, turned, and there it was. The statue of David standing high on a pedestal at the end of the main hallway. I walked right to the statue and just stood there in awe of Michelangelos creation. After a few minutes, I stepped back to give others a chance to get a good look at David. I walked around the rest of the museum to see the other sculptures on display. Everything in the museum was great. But I kept looking back at David. I was so amazed that something so beautiful could be carved out of such a hard stone. So as I was leaving the museum, I stopped a tour guide and I asked, Do we know anything about what inspired Michelangelo when he carved David? And he looked right at me and said in English with a heavy Italian accent, Yeah, yeah we do. Michelangelo said what inspired him. The guide then turned in the direction of David and quietly told me what Michelangelo had said. I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free. This is the moment I decided I wanted to be like Michelangelo. I think about this every night when I check on my little daughters. Every night since the day they were born, I go into their rooms just before I go to bed. I pull up their blankets and I kiss them on the cheek. I look at them sleeping peacefully and I think of Michelangelo. I see the angel inside each of them. We should all look for the angel inside ourselves and our loved ones. We should ask the question, What is that special place within all of us? We all have knowledge, skills, experiences and expectations that are part of the person we think we are. Yet at our core, we know theres something unique about us. Our best self is in there and we know it. Every day I try to ask myself, How can I help my daughters stay connected to their real strengths, to what they love, to do and what matters most to them in their lives? The science of Positive Psychology has found that this question is an important one to ask. Co-founder of Positive Psychology Martin Seligman, along with University of Michigan Psychologist Christopher Peterson, discovered that people become happier the more they engage their signature strengths. The late Don Clifton and Jim Harter, both of The Gallup Organization, found in their research: The more a strength is exercised, the more integrated it becomes . . . teachers, mentors and parents may accelerate the development of individuals by basing their expectations for a person on his or her talents. Michelangelo had it right. He focused on the good and he brought it to life. His statue of David is a reminder to us all to look for the best in others. Some day I will no longer be here to kiss my girls good night. When that day comes, I hope Eliana and Ariela will each say, My Dad saw the angel inside me. My Dad was my Michelangelo.
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10/29/2010 12:58 PM
Hug Now; Dont Save It Recently I arrived home from the office, and my dad was standing in the driveway. Dad is 62 and wears a full beard. He was talking to two pro football-sized construction workers. As I approached them, they all turned and looked at me. I said, Hi Dad. Hey guys. I then stepped forward, shook my dads hand, pulled him into me, hugged him and gave him a kiss on the cheek. I then walked into the house. For three generations my family has done the same thing. We kiss and hug when we see each other. We kiss and hug when we say goodbye. And we dont care who is watching. My parents taught me through their example. My grandmother reinforced this practice by something she said to me 32 years ago. I was nine years old. It was wintertime in Milwaukee. My family was leaving Northridge Shopping Mall after a movie. Mom, Dad, my brother Mike and my grandparents were there. I was mad at my dad. I still have no idea why. But I know that I was mad. I was pouting and I wasnt talking to him. It was snowing that night and the temperature was below freezing. Dad told us to wait inside the mall so that he could warm up the van and pull it up to the front door. Thats when Nana came up to me and said, Your father loves you and you love him. Dont go to bed angry at him. Kiss and hug him before you go to bed tonight. Tell him that you love him. You never know when the Lord will take him from you. Few words have had such an impact on me as those of my grandmother that night. You never know when the Lord will take him from you. Dawn and I recently attended the funeral of a colleagues father who had passed away of a major heart attack. His son was eulogizing him. He said that one minute his father was talking; the next minute he was gone. My colleague was respectful of his father and he recalled good times. And then he said something that deeply saddened us: I never did hear my father say that he loved me. My mother taught us that you hug, kiss and say that you love someone when you wake up, when you go to bed, before you leave the house and before you hang up the phone. Psychology researchers have long talked about the importance of feeling a secure attachment to the ones you love. You need to feel confident and secure in anothers love for you. The positive impact of this in your life is far reaching. Demonstrating affection and saying whats in your heart is the best way to nourish your most cherished relationships. Tony Dungy, head coach of the Indianapolis Colts of the National Football League, lost his 18 year-old son, James, two years ago. Eulogizing his son, Coach Dungy said that he had last seen his son at Thanksgiving. They had said goodbye before James left for the airport. Coach Dungy knew that he would see his son again soon. He did not think much about the casual way they said goodbye. But Coach Dungy never did see his son again. I never got to hug him again, he said. Thats one thing Ill always think about and always remind people to do: Hug em every chance you get. My Dad is now 77. He just visited me in my office. I hugged and kissed him when he arrived. I hugged and kissed him when he left. My grandmother would be proud.
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10/29/2010 1:00 PM
A Daily Dose of Awe and Gratitude Most of us wake up thinking about how we are going to meet obligations and fulfill promises to other people. We begin our day in response mode and remain that way until its time to go to bed. For 12 years, I have begun my day with the same positive ritual. The First Step: Experiencing Awe No matter where I am, I start my day with a moment of awe. I wake up and head for the nearest window. I open the curtain and look outside. When Im at home, I look at the ocean. When Im at a hotel, I look at tall buildings. When Im in Maine, I look at trees. Wherever I am, there is always something interesting to draw my attention. Each time I look out my window, I appreciate the fact that the universe does not revolve around me. It includes me. Immersed in the wonder and awe of something that I cannot explain, this first step in my morning ritual reminds me that the world is much bigger than my life and my concerns. My mom grew up in Maine and often reflects on the beauty of nature. She once said to me, Think of the beauty of maple trees. The same force that makes sap run up a tree from its roots to its trunk, against gravity, is the same force that resides inside of you. Mom made her point by gently poking me in the gut and saying, Its right there connect to it. Profound Outcomes University of Virginia Psychologist Jonathan Haidt, author of the Happiness Hypothesis, and Dacher Keltner, University of California-Berkeley Psychology professor, wrote about awe in Christopher Peterson and Martin Seligmans book, Character Strengths and Virtues: People consistently report that experiences of awe and elevation have profound outcomes, motivating self-improvement, personal change, altruistic intentions and actions and the devotion to others and the larger community. The Second Step: Verbalizing Gratitude The second step of my morning ritual focuses on gratitude. I say everything for which I am grateful. Philosophers, religious leaders and teachers have taught us for thousands of years to begin our day by expressing and feeling gratitude for everything and everyone we have in our lives. My list includes being grateful for a new day, the sleep I had the night before, my health, my family (by name), my close friends (by name), my key supporters in business (by name) and important opportunities professionally and personally. I make it a habit of visualizing the people and things as I say them. I want to keep these images fresh in my mind. Grateful individuals have a sense of abundance," according to research by psychology professor Phillip Watkins and his colleagues at Eastern Washington University. "Grateful individuals appreciate the common everyday pleasures of life . . . grateful individuals appreciate the contribution of others to their well-being. Rewards of a Ritual A ritual can smooth lifes transition as can perhaps nothing else," wrote Huston Smith, professor of Religion and Philosophy at Syracuse University, in his book The Religions of Man. Gratitude and awe in my morning ritual helps me transition from a night of sleep to a new day of possibility. Rituals also serve another function, says Smith, "namely to intensify appreciation and crown mans joy with celebration. Every day is a new opportunity. What would happen if you started each day with a little awe and gratitude? This positive ritual could change your life.
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10/29/2010 1:00 PM
A-Ha! The Thinking Power of the Subconscious Think! Think harder. Come on! Think. How often have you said that to yourself? If you just think harder and faster, youll figure it out. Science is saying, Wait a minute. Literally. The message is wait a minute. Your most creative ideas do not come to you after you squint and make a thinking sound, mmmmm. Research is pointing to a better way to get the best answers: Its through your unconscious mind. Ap Dijkersterhuis and Loran Nordgren of the University of Amsterdam have found in their extensive research that people make better decisions if they involve unconscious thinking. In their research paper A Theory of Unconscious Thought they describe how . . . unconscious thinkers made better decisions than conscious thinkers or immediate choosers. Dijkersterhuis and Nordgren discovered that when people were given an opportunity to think about other things following the presentation of a problem to solve, they did better than participants who were asked to solve the problem immediately, or those who were asked to concentrate on the problem before they responded. Think about it. When have some of the best and most important ideas come to you in your life? Where were you? What were you doing at the time? Most of us report that our most creative ideas come to us when were exercising, reading a thought-provoking book, praying, meditating, doing laundry, playing with our children, sitting on a plane, driving a car or when we wake up in the morning. Isnt it great when a big idea suddenly comes to you? But how is it possible? You werent even thinking about it. Your focus was somewhere else. Your conscious thought didnt produce it. It was your unconscious mind at work. Our brain never sleeps. Its always on. Our brain is considered the most powerful supercomputer on the planet. Its memory and problem solving power are unequaled. Dijkersterhuis and Nordgren describe the comparative power of the conscious and unconscious mind. Depending on the context, consciousness can process between 10 and 60 bites per second. As an illustration, when you read, you process about 45 bits per second, which corresponds to a fairly short sentence. The entire human system combined, however, was argued to be able to process about 11.2 million bits. So how do you use that power every day? What do you plug into your own personal supercomputer? What do you give it to think about? Whats your positive ritual? Heres what I do each morning. Everyday, after my awe and gratitude exercise (see last weeks column), I tell myself that I am a writer and I get detailed. I describe everything I find gratifying about writing and I visualize my plans. Why? I love writing and I want to do more of it. I feed my supercomputer with these thoughts every day. Every morning I have a positive ritual of focusing my thinking on what I enjoy doing the most. Psychology researcher Jon Haidt in the Happiness Hypothesis wrote, And whenever one pursues a goal, a part of the mind automatically monitors progress, so that it can order corrections or know when success has been achieved. So start each day by thinking about what you love to do. Give your unconscious mind something to think about while youre off consciously doing other things. And enjoy your next A-Ha! moment!
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10/29/2010 1:01 PM
Name a Strength and Make a Difference Show me the trunk of your car. Hand me your luggage. Step back. Ill find a way to fit it all in. Why? Because Im a good packer. No car, no mini-van, no SUV scares me. I can squeeze anything in no matter what you drive. You can call my trunk-packing a sort of strength. I can do it consistently well and I enjoy doing it. Over the years Ive volunteered to pack the family trunk thousands of times. And Ive been called in for the most difficult of jobs. Im the go-to guy of trunk-packing. Now, of course, theres a beginning to every success story. Heres mine. One day my Dad everyone called him Big Lou was having trouble finding a place in the trunk for one last bag. As he stepped back to take a better look, I stepped forward, adjusted three bags and slipped the final bag into place. I felt like I had just laid down the final piece of a jigsaw puzzle. I looked up at Big Lou. Big Lou looked down at me, and said, David, youre a good packer. I swelled with pride. I was nine years old. Martin Seligman, co-founder of Positive Psychology, and Christopher Peterson, a leading Positive Psychology researcher at the University of Michigan, found in their research that by simply naming a strength in someone you amplify it. My dad named my strength over three decades ago. And he did more than that. Like a good leader, like a good father, my dad turned that experience into a story and he told everyone. And he made sure that I could hear him telling it. Think about your employees. Think about your children. How many times have you named their strengths? And how often have they heard you proudly telling others about their strengths? The best leaders know that their belief in their employees strengths has a positive impact on their performance. It also affects the goals their employees set. Stanford Psychology Professor Albert Bandura found in his research that the goals held for others convey to them a belief in their capability to fulfill them. So the next time you notice your employees, your spouse or your children doing something very well, consider naming the strengths you see. Watch them light up. Watch how much more they use their strengths. Theyll apply them often and theyll do it with pride. Youll have made a difference. Recently I stepped out of my car in the Toys R Us parking lot and I saw a young boy, his mother and his grandmother trying to squeeze his new bicycle into their car. I stopped and offered my help. Why? Because Im a good packer. For 10 minutes the boy and I struggled to find a way to get the bike in the car. We came close many times. But, finally, the mother called the boys father and said that they might not be able to bring the bike home. But I wouldnt give up. Why? Because Im a good packer. A few minutes later, I paused and thought we might not actually be able to get the bike in the car. I stepped back and the little boy saw my face and said, Wait. He reached in, grabbed the front tire, moved it ever so slightly and said to me, Push. And I did. The bike slipped right into place. I saw him light up with pride. I smiled, walked over to him, put my hand on his shoulder, and said, Youre a good packer.
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10/29/2010 1:01 PM
Follow Your Dreams to Find Your True Path in Life Find Your True Path in Life: First in a four-part series. I had a dream in 1986. I was a student at Yale University. It changed my life. I was trapped inside a large office building. I couldnt find a way out. I looked everywhere. I ran down hallways. I cut through offices. There were no exits. I saw a staircase in the distance. I ran to it. As I approached it I realized that it was just the shadow of a staircase behind a wall. I knew what I had to do. I dropped my shoulder and broke through the wall. I landed on the stairs and started to climb as fast as I could. I ran and I ran up the stairs. But there were no exits. I began to panic. What if there was no escape? And then I saw a thin line of light above. It appeared to be a light beneath a door to the outside. As I got closer I could see it was an exit. I sprinted. I reached the top and lunged for the door. It flew wide open, and I kept running. I looked up; I was horrified. I was on the roof of a skyscraper and I was headed for the side of the building. I tried to stop, but the roof sloped steeply down to the edge. My momentum was too great. I knew my life would soon be over. I reached the side of the tower and I began to take flight. And in the last moment before certain death, my right hand caught a lip on the edge of the roof. I held on with everything I had. I was now dangling by my fingers a hundred stories above the ground. And then I woke up. I was breathing heavily. My heart was racing. I was wet with sweat. Yet my mind was clear. The symbolism of my dream became evident to me. I felt trapped on a path. I was locked inside a tower with no exits. I struggled to find a way out, and when I did, my life hung in the balance. My future was clinging to a decision I had to make, one I had been thinking about for three months. I needed to explore what I wanted to do with my life. I could no longer let lifes opportunities pass me by. I needed to do everything I had ever dreamed about. The dream was the final sign. And so I made the decision. I took a year off from school to pursue my interests. I worked part-time to cover the expenses of my exploration. I went to concerts, lectures, plays and poetry readings. I became a DJ at the campus radio station. I joined AIESEC, an international leadership organization located on nearly 1,000 university campuses in 100 countries. Through AIESEC I represented the United States at an international congress in Innsbruck, traveled throughout Western and Eastern Europe and worked in West Berlin for two months. And then I received a scholarship from the Yale Center for British Art to study in London for the summer. I did not plan these opportunities. They came after I started exploring. My search led me to a whole new set of possibilities, and a better understanding of what I love, and what I do well. My year off from school was one of the most rewarding periods of my life. I found my path. Do you have a similar decision you need to make? Is there something you would like to do with your life? What if you could make time to do it? Pay attention to your daydreams. Pay attention to your dreams at night. Listen for whats really important to you. Thirteenth-Century poet and mystic Jalaluddin Rumi wrote, Though we seem to be sleeping, there is an inner wakefulness that directs the dream, and that will eventually startle us back to the truth of who we are. Our dreams during the day or night are telling us something. What are your dreams telling you? Over the next three columns well explore how you can pursue your true path in life.
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10/29/2010 1:02 PM
Find Out What You Love to Do: Take a Fill Year (Finding your true path in life - Second in a four-part series.) Find out what you love to do. Start exploring your interests now. Take, what I call, a Fill Year. The goal of your Fill Year is to explore as many of your interests as possible. The key to finding your true path in life is through exploration. Get out and try things. Whatever interests you, pursue it. But youre busy. You work full time. You have children. You have other responsibilities. What can you do? I did some homework for you. I figured out that you have the equivalent of 18 work weeks per year to explore your interests. Heres a look at the math I used: You have 30 minutes at lunch three times per week, 30 minutes at night three times per week, two weekend days per month and one week of your annual vacation time. With a little planning and determination you can fill your year with many meaningful activities. But if you are already feeling maxed out, how can you dedicate so much time for exploration? Take my Morning Test to find out. Heres how it works. Every night for one week write down everything that you do at lunch and at night. Jot down the e-mail you read, the sites you surf, the radio programs you listen to, the TV shows you watch and whatever else you do. Then immediately after waking up the next morning and this is important think about what you did the day before at lunch and at night. Think about everything you did that still makes you happy, and what you think was a waste of time. Write it all down. Do this for one week and see which activities are meaningful to you and which ones you do by force of habit. Heres your opportunity. Replace some of your less helpful habits with activities that are gratifying to you. Now how do you know what is fulfilling to you? Start by looking back at the main periods in your life: childhood, high school, college, jobs, marriage, children and your career. When were you the happiest? When were you the most successful? What were you doing? What were you learning? What activities did you enjoy? What were you reading? What were you writing? With whom were you spending time? Your answers to these questions will help uncover your passions in life. How else can you find clues to what you love to do? Ask the people in your life what they think. What have they seen you do well? In what have you expressed an interest? Ask your family. Ask your friends. Ask your co-workers. Their insight might surprise you. How can you find out what activities are available to you? Check your local newspaper, TV and radio event calendars. Call your local universities, museums, libraries, theatres, concert halls, hotels, chambers of commerce, local governments and houses of worship. Find out which associations have chapters in your area. Get a listing of local clubs. See whats interesting to you and start plugging activities into your calendar. Some of you may be thinking that you cannot take this time away from your spouse, children, parents, friends or co-workers. This is where you play Fill Year Matchmaking. Determine who would be willing to participate in some of these activities that you find interesting, and then invite them to go along with you. Theyll appreciate the invitation, and youll do something fun together. And youll have taken another step forward in your year of exploration. Get excited about your future. Take a Fill Year now. Find your true path.
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10/29/2010 1:03 PM
How to Keep Your Job While You Find Your True Path in Life Third in a four-part series. Andy Rooney, journalist and television commentator, once wrote, Ive learned that everyone wants to live on top of the mountain, but all the happiness and growth occurs while youre climbing it. The science of Positive Psychology backs Rooneys wisdom. Research by University of Pennsylvania psychologist Martin Seligman has demonstrated that when people have the opportunity to use their natural strengths, experience positive emotion and engage in meaningful activities, they are happy. Seligmans research points to the importance of the voyage of life, not just the final port of call. Last week I told you to take a Fill Year if you are searching for your true path in life. In a Fill Year, you explore the activities that engage your strengths, and the activities that are gratifying to you. Whatever interests you, pursue it. Get out and try things. Do as 13th Century poet and mystic Jalaluddin Rumi advised: Respond to every call that excites your spirit. But then some of you wrote to me and asked, What if I want to explore my interests without having to give up my job? The answer - start a Fill Year project at work. With a little planning and creativity, you can find opportunities to explore your interests with the blessing and support of your company. Consider how you might participate in company initiatives related to your interests. What events does your company sponsor that you could attend? What volunteer activities could you sign up for, or plan? Which task forces or committees could you join? Which training sessions could you attend? Which ones could you lead? What party could you organize? What employee recognition event could you design? What educational session could you coordinate? Who could you mentor? What research could you conduct? What newsletter could you write? Find out who shares your interests in your company. Form groups. Join organizations. Go to events together. When I worked for MasterCard, I went to lectures after work with members of other departments. Our exploration together led to an even better partnership at work. What could you do with senior management? What could you do with your team? What could you do with another department? Companies love to see their employees participate in team-building activities inside and outside of work. What fun and interesting activities would your company support? When I worked for Yahoo!, I used to give my employees a budget each month to plan events that brought our department together. What activities could you arrange? Now, what if youre contemplating a new career or opening your own business? Follow my grandfathers advice. He used to say, If you want to go into the stationery business, work in a stationery store. His message was to learn first, then decide if you want to take the plunge. Use some of your Fill Year to work part-time or volunteer in a business that youre interested in. Do it for the experience, not for the money. Autotelic is my favorite big word. It means, having an end or purpose in and not apart from itself. It comes from the Greek word autotelis which translates to complete in itself. Your Fill Year goal is to engage in as many autotelic experiences as possible. You choose activities that are meaningful to you no matter where they might take you. These activities are worth doing for their own sake. I went to a how to write professionally seminar after work with colleagues from another department at MasterCard; I thought it would be interesting. Ten years and two companies later, Im now a syndicated newspaper columnist. Follow your interests. You never know where they will take you.
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10/29/2010 1:03 PM
Discover Your True Path; Let Other People Teach You Final in a four-part series. One key to discovering your true path in life is to let other people teach you. You can learn by observing others. When I was 17 years old, I thought I wanted to be an orthopedic surgeon. So I took advantage of an offer to shadow the Milwaukee Brewers team doctor for a day. I expected to watch surgeries and meet baseball players. Instead, this is what I experienced. There were no surgeries to watch. There were no baseball stadiums to visit. There were just countless examination room doors to open and close. We visited patients in his office all day long more than I can remember. I knew the visits were important. My own orthopedic doctors helped me many times. I just didnt realize how much of a doctors week was spent in the office. I learned in one day that the path of a doctor was not for me. Who will you observe this year to test an interest of yours? Dont romanticize an interest. Investigate it. You can learn by asking others. Meet with people who love what they do in your company. Ask them what excites them about their work. Ask them how they discovered their passion. Ask them what they did to reach this point in their career. You will learn a lot about yourself as you listen to their stories. You will also expand and deepen your relationships at work as a result. The colleagues you interview will feel appreciated by your interest. When I was at Yahoo!, one of the many people I respected and admired was Kirk Froggatt, former vice president of human resources. Kirk loved any activity that helped inspire and develop Yahoo! employees. One day he joined me for lunch. At the time I was running Yahoo!s Customer Care Division. We talked for two hours. He then gave me a book. I read it over one weekend. And then, over the ensuing months, I read Kirks white papers, plans, and recommended books. I loved everything he sent to me. And along the way, I discovered that my true path was in the field of learning and development. One year later, I moved into a full-time role leading the training organization at Yahoo!. It started with a lunch. With whom will you meet this year? Be humble. Reach out. You can learn by the example of others. In 1917, my grandfather lived in Brunswick, Maine. He worked as a bookkeeper for the Bath Iron Works, the largest shipbuilder in the country at the time. He worked long hours. He lived at home. He had no extra money. He had an elementary-school education. And he dreamed of becoming an accountant. Despite his circumstances, my grandfather found a way to pursue his dream. He adhered to a motto: I can. I will. My grandfather borrowed the correspondence course books that his older brother had purchased years earlier to study accounting. He set aside two hours every night after work to read the books and take the practice tests without looking at his brothers answers. My grandfather would then clear his mind with a walk, and then go to bed. For two years, he followed this plan. In 1919, my grandfather passed the State of Maine accounting exam. The original certificate conferring my grandfathers right to practice accounting hangs in my parents living room. It reminds my family what you can achieve when you make time for pursuing your true path. Whose example will you emulate this year? Learn from their journey. One key to discovering your true path is to let other people teach you. Observe them. Ask them. Emulate them.
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10/29/2010 1:04 PM
Its Not a Catastrophe! Dont Build a Jack Story Theres one line that keeps me from dwelling on the negative when difficult things happen in my life. Its the moral of a story my dad told me when I was growing up. Heres Dads story as he told it. A guy is driving through the desert when one of his tires blows out. He gets out of his car and pops open the trunk to look for a spare tire and a jack. He sees the spare, but theres no jack. Oh s***! he yells. Ive got to walk back to the gas station I passed five miles ago! So he starts walking. I hope he has a jack, he says to himself. Half way there he mumbles anxiously, He better have a jack. When hes almost there he growls, That son of a b**** better let me use his jack! Minutes later he finally arrives at the gas station. Hes hot, hes frustrated, hes fuming. He sees the station owner in the garage and he walks up to him and says, Hey buddy! You can just forget it! Keep your g****** jack! He turns around and walks five miles back to his car . . . with no jack. And then this is when Dad looked at me, smiled and warned: Dont build a Jack Story. Dad believed you gain nothing by obsessing on the worst things that could happen in a situation. Why invest all your energy in imagining only scenarios that end poorly? Not only do you make yourself feel terrible, you still have to deal with the problem at hand. Psychologists Karen Reivich and Andrew Shatte wrote about the perils of catastrophic thinking in their book, The Resilience Factor. For many people, they wrote, their anxiety takes over and they catastrophize they dwell on a current adversity and within a few minutes have imagined a chain of disastrous events stretching into the future. Reivich and Shatte outline an effective five-step method for countering catastrophic thinking. Heres what they suggest: 1. Name your adversity and the worst-case things you believe could happen as a result. 2. Evaluate the probability that each of these events will happen. Youll see the odds are long against any of them coming to pass. 3. Next, think of the best-case scenarios possible. They should be so unrealistic that they make you smile, or even laugh. You want to break your doom and gloom thinking. 4. Now that youve plotted the extreme cases youve identified the worst and the best results possible focus on the most-likely outcomes of the adversity. 5. Then, with your newfound perspective, come up with a solution to remedy the problem. The bottom line is that we all experience setbacks. Unfortunately, we often forget to look at these situations like even-tempered Sergeant Just the Facts Joe Friday on the classic television show, Dragnet. Instead, we turn into Chicken Little and say, The sky is falling! Martin Seligman, best known for his research on learned helplessness, learned optimism and his role in founding the science of Positive Psychology, believes that pessimism rarely serves us well. Seligman summarized the result of over 20 years of research on pessimism in his book, Authentic Happiness. Pessimists . . . are up to eight times more likely to become depressed when bad events happen, he wrote. They do worse at school, sports and most jobs than their talents augur. They have worse physical health and shorter lives. They have rockier interpersonal relations, and they lose American presidential elections to their more optimistic opponents. Remember Seligmans research on pessimism it doesnt pay. So follow Reivich and Shattes advice to counter catastrophic thinking. And just remember what my dad said, Dont build a Jack Story.
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10/29/2010 1:05 PM
North Star Writers Group - Syndicated Commentary: Opinion, Humor...
Let Positive Triggers Turn on Your Best Self One day last year I was sitting in my office by myself and I wasnt feeling good. Yes, its true. I research, write and speak about Positive Psychology, but I admit it. I wasnt having a good day. Heres my first question: Where do you look when youre feeling bad? Most of us look down. And thats what I was doing in my office, I was looking down at the floor. And then I started laughing! I realized that Ariela and Eliana, my two- and three-year-old little girls, had put stickers all over my shoes. Somehow they slipped them on when I was kissing my wife Dawn goodbye before I left the house that morning. Just thinking about my little girls slipping stickers on my shoes without my knowing made me laugh. But then I laughed even harder when I thought, Where had I been all morning with stickers stuck all over my shoes? It was at that moment I got it. The stickers my little girls had put on my shoes were a positive trigger for me. They instantly made me feel good. So here's my second question: Where do you look when you're feeling good? You look up! And that's what I did in my office. I looked up and my day was reset. I had a second chance to make my day a good one. I was experiencing positive emotion. Research studies from around the world have confirmed the power of positive emotion. Positive psychology researcher Barbara Fredrickson at the University of North Carolina, best known for her Broaden and Build Theory of Positive Emotion, found in her research that positive emotions widen your attention, increase your intuition and increase your resilience to adversity. Alice Isen, a psychology researcher at Cornell University, demonstrated that when you experience positive emotion, you are more kind, generous and helpful. Isen also found that youre more creative and better able to solve problems requiring ingenuity and innovation. Richard Davidson, a neuropsychology researcher at the University of Wisconsin, discovered that positive emotions help boost your immune system. And at least three studies have shown that there is a strong connection between a longer life and experiencing frequent positive emotion. Here's my takeaway. If you are being chased by a bear in the forest, you should feel plenty of negative emotion! As my grandmother used to say, "Run like the dickens!" Otherwise, positive emotions help you think better and help you build better relationships with others. People prefer to be around curious and creative people, more than around people who always seem to be running away from bears! And Ill bet, if you ask the people in your life, theyll tell you that when youre experiencing positive emotion, you do better work, youre a better leader, youre a better spouse and youre a better friend. I know that Im a better dad to two little girls when Im experiencing positive emotion. So what are your positive triggers? What makes you smile? What makes you laugh? What puts you in a creative mood? What triggers your passion, excitement and hope? For some of us it's looking at pictures of our loved ones. Some of us listen to a favorite song. Others go for a quick walk, or do a little dance. Some read a short, funny story. Others remind themselves of their goals. Take a moment to think about the things that trigger your positive emotions. Think of it this way. When you enter a dark room, what do you do? You reach for the light switch. Because you know when you flip it, just like that, youll have light. So what's your light switch? What turns on your positive emotions? What positive triggers will help you look up when you're feeling down? Need some stickers?
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10/29/2010 1:06 PM
Rituals and Reminders: Theyre Great, Unless You Forget Their Meaning When I was growing up, we would put a rubber band on our wrist if we wanted to remember something. The rubber band represented the action we were supposed to take later in the day. Once we did what we had intended to do, we took off the band. And we would repeat the ritual any time we needed help remembering something. A few years ago, this idea was carried to another level. Millions of people across the country began wearing even thicker rubber bands on their wrists. These bands came imprinted with an inspirational message. Lance Armstrongs band is probably the most popular among them. Armstrongs band says Live Strong. Many people have worn these bands for years, never removing them from their wrists. This phenomenon fascinated me. So I conducted an informal survey with people who were wearing these bands. I asked each one, When you look at your band each day, how does it help you? Without exception each person I polled said something like, You know, I mostly forget Im wearing it. Many of them would then tell me the reason they put it on their wrist in the first place they wanted to make it clear that the initial ritual act was meaningful. The problem was that they were seldom consciously aware that they were wearing the band in the weeks, months and years that followed. Wedding rings are another example of this challenge. How many times over the years have you stopped, looked at your ring and repeated the vows that you made to your spouse on your wedding day? Do you know anyone who reviews their marriage commitments on a daily basis? Your ring tells others that you are married and thats about it. It doesnt say anything about your love. It doesnt say that you are faithful. It doesnt say that you are respectful. It just says that you are legally connected to another person in marriage. You wear your ring without thought, it rarely reminds you to love, honor and cherish your spouse. A ritual object, whether its a band or a ring, loses its power to positively influence your life if it does not remind you of its intended significance. Consider the Bible. Deuteronomy 11:18 calls for the use of a ritual object to amplify the power of a daily commandment: Therefore shall ye lay up these my words in your heart and in your soul, and bind them for a sign upon your hand, that they be as frontlets between your eyes. For thousands of years the worlds major religions have tried to combat the tendency of its followers to forget whats most important in life. Religions prescribe rituals that employ a combination of self-reflection, physical action and the use of objects to inspire their followers to lead a virtuous life every day. So if you choose to wear or carry something, whether its a band, a ring, a charm, frontlets, a picture or anything else, make sure that the message it represents is personally meaningful. Take the live strong message and add your own language to make it your own. Translate your marriage vows into a daily ritual of love for your spouse. If these ritual acts were worth doing once, their meaning is worth remembering always. Let your ritual object remind you to be your best self every day. Let it remind you of everything for which you are grateful. Let it remind you of the best life you can imagine living. Let it remind you to smile. What do you want to remember today? Bring out a rubber band if you need one.
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10/29/2010 1:08 PM
Let Your Subconscious Mind Work for You My dads father understood the power of the subconscious. When I couldnt figure something out as I was growing up, my grandfather used to say, Take a walk. Clear your mind. He believed that if you set aside your issue for a little while, you would allow your subconscious mind to bring forth new and better thoughts, not just the few you already had. As a result, you would come up with a better idea. It turns out that my grandfather was right. In his book The Biology of Belief, cell biologist Bruce Lipton reported, the subconscious mind . . . processes some 20,000,000 environmental stimuli per second v. 40 environmental stimuli interpreted by the conscious mind in the same second Ap Dijkersterhuis and Loran Nordgren of the University of Amsterdam demonstrated in their research the power of subconscious thinking. Conscious thought is constrained by the low capacity of consciousness. Unconscious thought does not have this constraint because the unconscious has a much higher capacity. It follows that conscious thought by necessity often only takes into account a subset of the information it should take into account. I have a challenge for you: Think of five things right now. Keep them in your mind. Try it. You can do it. Concentrate on these five things. Okay. Howd you do? If youre like most people, your head is still spinning from trying to hold onto those five thoughts. Why? Its because your conscious mind attends to one thought at a time. Now think about your day. Youre busy. Youre moving from one activity to the next. And to get things done you have to focus on each activity as youre doing them. A great day is when you get through your to do list. But how often is that? Heres the challenge. What if you want to improve your life in some meaningful way? How can you? Your schedule is maxed out. You dont have time to think about making a significant change in your life. You know that from experience. So you find yourself saying that you cannot make the change, at least not while youre over-booked. Now, if you can only think of one thing at a time and your daily agenda is already full, how are you ever going to make the changes necessary to help you achieve your best possible life? Heres the answer: Let your subconscious mind work for you. Tell yourself whats important to you. Focus on what you want to achieve in your life, and make this the first thing you do every morning. By doing so, you will give direction to your subconscious mind. Dr. Jeffrey Schwartz of the USC Medical School wrote, Perhaps any behavior change brought about by leaders, managers, therapists, trainers, or coaches is primarily a function of their ability to induce others to focus their attention on specific ideas close enough, often enough and for a long enough time. When you begin your day thinking about what you want most in your life, you are training your mind to seek opportunities to fulfill your intention. Theoretical physicist Henry Stapp wrote, By virtue of the quantum laws of motion, a strong intention, manifested by the high rapidity of the similar intentional acts, will tend to hold in place the associated template for action. Make the start of every morning an intentional act. Give your subconscious mind the opportunity to help you construct the life you want to live. If you do this every day, just think what good things could happen in your life.
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10/29/2010 1:09 PM
Bosses: Start With Whats Good and Focus on Strengths
Imagine that you arrive home after a long day at work. Your spouse is waiting for you. He asks you to grab a cup of coffee and to meet him in the home office. You do what he asks, and you find him sitting across the desk waiting for you to take your seat. You sit down and he says, Ive been thinking about your performance over the last six months and Ive come up with a list of things you need to improve. Let me run down the list and lets come up with a development plan. And what would be your response? What the - #?@! Are you kidding me?! After all I do around here, this is how you show your appreciation! You have a list for me?! If youre like anyone I know, you wouldnt be happy. The question is, Would this ever really happen? The answer: It happens in companies every day. Most managers focus on whats bad about employees, not whats good about them. For many managers, its not all their fault. This is what they have been taught: Focus on the weaknesses and an employee will get better. Well, theyve been taught wrong. Why would this strategy succeed at work and fail miserably at home? It wont. We resent unbalanced feedback, and we feel shortchanged and unappreciated when our managers or loved ones put the spotlight only on our faults. This is a serious issue in business. Do you know why most employees leave companies? If you answered money, try again. Money consistently comes in third place or lower. Research shows that this is the number one answer: I left because of my boss. The late Don Clifton, former CEO of the Gallup Organization, and Jim Harter, Gallups chief scientist, discovered in their research that the greatest gains in human development are based on investment in what people do best. Martin Seligman, co-founder of the science of Positive Psychology, has found in his studies that people who engage their strengths are more successful and they are happier. Consider the Miami Heat, the 2006 champions of the NBA. Shaquille ONeill is one of the worst free-throw shooters in the history of the NBA, yet he led the Heat to their first championship ever. Did Miami win by ONeill increasing his free-throw shooting percentage by just under 1 percent (he went from 46.1 percent to 46.9 percent), or did they do it by leveraging his talent and letting other players, like Dwayne Wade, bring out their best game? We know the answers. Success comes when people do what they do best. If you dont get this, youll be the reason your employees leave your company. Youll be the reason your children dont want to be around you. Focusing only on weaknesses leads to bad results. So what can you do right now if youre a manager or a parent? Start by looking for what your employees, or your children do well. What do they love to do? When do they succeed? What strengths do they use most? Then give them more opportunities to use these strengths. Look for ways they can apply them. Partner them with people who can help them do their best even better, and work around their lesser strengths. And dont forget to tell them, I know what you do around here and I appreciate it. Imagine what your company would be like, and what your family would be like, if everyone focused first on whats good. Focus on strengths.
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10/29/2010 1:10 PM
Gratitude Is a Bridge to Your Positive Future Gratitude is a bridge to your positive future. It is your passageway to success. Think about a bridge crossing a river. It must have strong supporting foundations on both banks. Without the foundations securely anchored, the bridge will collapse, and you cannot make the crossing. And so it is with your bridge to your positive future. The stronger your foundation of gratitude, the greater the distance your bridge can take you in life. And the strength of your gratitude depends on your awareness of the support you have to achieve your best possible life. Robert Solomon, the late philosophy professor and scholar at the University of Texas at Austin, discussed gratitude in an essay he contributed to The Psychology of Gratitude by Robert Emmons and Michael McCullough. Solomon wrote, One can take ones life and its advantages for granted, but how much better it is to acknowledge not only those advantages but ones gratitude for them. Gratitude also likens the emotion of trust, wrote Solomon, it involves an admission of our vulnerability and our dependence on other people. Gratitude helps us recognize the support that we have received on our path to achieve the life we have. Gratitude provides you with the courage to pursue your ambition in life. Gratitude reminds you of everything that you have what you remember strengthens your bridge to a positive future. And there are four key ways to reinforce your foundation of gratitude. A Reminder of Your Key People First, gratitude reminds you of all the key people in your life. Think of these individuals now. Who are the people who advise you? Who are the people who challenge you? Who are the people who set you straight when you veer off course? And who are the people who give you a hug when you need one? Be grateful for these people strengthen your bridge. A Reminder of Your Strengths Second, gratitude reminds you of your strengths. Think of what comes naturally to you. What do you do well? What do you enjoy doing? What do others say you excel in? What are your gifts? Be grateful for what makes you unique strengthen your bridge. A Reminder of Your Achievements Third, gratitude reminds you of what you have achieved. Think about what you have accomplished in your life. What goals have you met? What successes have you enjoyed? Be grateful for your achievements strengthen your bridge. A Reminder of the Wonders Around You Finally, gratitude reminds you of the wonders around you the warmth of the sun, the glow of the moon and stars, the current of a river, the ripples of a lake, the waves of an ocean, the comfort of a breeze, the colors of flowers, the majesty of tall trees, the utility of buildings, the speed of planes and the power of trains. Be grateful for the miracles of nature and the wondrous products of man strengthen your bridge. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the German theologian, pastor and Nazi resister, wrote about gratitude in this way: In ordinary life we hardly realize that we receive a great deal more than we give, and that it is only with gratitude that life becomes rich. When you fill your life with gratitude, you will experience the feeling of abundance in your relationships, your strengths, your achievements and everything that is miraculous and powerful around you. Gratitude strengthens your bridge to your best possible life. Enjoy the crossing!
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10/29/2010 1:10 PM
Want to Be Happier? Learn the Law of the Garbage Truck How often do you let other peoples nonsense change your mood? Do you let a bad driver, rude waiter, curt boss or an insensitive employee ruin your day? Unless youre the Terminator, youre probably set back on your heels. However, the mark of your success is how quickly you can refocus on whats important. Sixteen years ago I learned this lesson. And I learned it in the back of a New York City taxi cab. Heres what happened: I hopped in a taxi, and we took off for Grand Central Station. We were driving in the right lane when all of a sudden a black car jumped out of a parking space right in front of us. My taxi driver slammed on his brakes, the car skidded, the tires squealed and at the last moment the car stopped just one inch from the other cars back-end. And what did we see next? The driver of the other car, the guy who almost caused a big accident, whipped his head around and he started swearing at us. How do I know? Ask any New Yorker, some words in New York come with a special face. And then heres what blew me away. My taxi driver just smiled and waved at the guy. And I mean, he was friendly. So, I said, Why did you just do that!? This guy could have killed us! And this is when my taxi driver told me what I now call, The Law of the Garbage Truck He said: Many people are like garbage trucks. They run around full of garbage, full of frustration, full of anger, and full of disappointment. As their garbage piles up, they need a place to dump it. And if you let them, theyll dump it on you. So when someone wants to dump on you, dont take it personally. Just smile, wave, wish them well and move on. Believe me. Youll be happier. So I started thinking, how often do I let Garbage Trucks run right over me? And how often do I take their garbage and spread it to other people at work, at home or on the street? It was then that I said, I dont want the garbage and Im not going to spread it anymore. I began to see Garbage Trucks. Like in the movie The Sixth Sense, where the little boy said, I see Dead People. Well now I see Garbage Trucks. I see the load theyre carrying. I see them coming to drop it off. And like my taxi driver, I dont take it personally; I just smile, wave, wish them well and move on. The bottom line is that successful people do not let Garbage Trucks take over their day. What about you? What would happen in your life, starting today, if you let more Garbage Trucks pass you by? And my taxi driver was right. I am happier.
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10/29/2010 1:11 PM
Are You Pushing the Same Buttons? I entered an office tower the other day and headed for the elevators. No one was waiting there so I pushed the Up button. The white button lit up and turned a bright orange. Then someone came up on my left, looked at the elevators, looked at me and then pushed the brightly lit orange Up button. He backed away and waited for about three seconds. He then stepped forward and pushed the brightly lit button again. Someone then came up on my right and headed straight for the button. This time he pressed the button three times fast and parked himself in front of it. Within two seconds, he pressed the button like he was operating a jackhammer. You know the sound: Dah-dah-dah-dahdah-dah-dah! I have watched this same scene thousands of times. But, heres the question: Does pushing the elevator button numerous times and by different people help bring the elevator faster? I called the experts to find out. I spoke with the service center at the Otis Elevator Company, one of the oldest and best-known elevator companies in the world. I asked the question and this is what I learned. Pressing the button more than once only wears out the button! It does nothing to influence the movement of the elevator. The Service Manager even told me, Some people think they can communicate with the elevator through Morse code. They cant. It will not come any faster because you pressed the button again. Now heres the real question, Where else in our lives do we use this push button approach? Where else do we do the same thing every time even though it doesnt work? If youre a leader, think about how you motivate your employees. Whats your thing? What do you do that you think works? Now, go ahead and be bold. Ask your employees if what you do really does motivate them. Youll often find your thing is as effective as pushing the brightly lit orange button more than once. Now pressing the elevator button numerous times does not actually bother the elevator. However, people do not like it when we repeatedly press their buttons. They get annoyed, frustrated or simply bored with our ineffective tactics. And while elevators dont talk to other elevators about our behavior, people do. They magnify our poor choices by telling others. Employees do not respond to tips and tricks. They respond to your personal interest and attention. They are positively influenced by you when they know that you have their best interests in mind. They listen to you when you communicate in a way that makes sense to them. The good news is that we can exchange our button pressing for more effective actions. Just ask your employees what to do. Ask each of your employees what motivates them. Ask them how they like to be recognized. Ask them how they like you to share good news with them. Ask them how they like you to share constructive feedback with them. Ask them how often they want you to check in. Your time is best spent finding out what inspires each of your employees, not doing the same old thing with everyone. Watch the faces of your employees when you ask these questions. They will be wide-eyed and happy you asked. Act on their answers and really watch what happens you will be seen as a leader who inspires employees to achieve their best. So the next time you reach to push the elevator button twice, let it remind you to check your leadership and management habits. Youll be happy you did, and your employees will enjoy the ride!
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10/29/2010 1:12 PM
Great Service Worth Its Weight in Diamonds I learned two key things while building and running large customer service organizations. First, good service is "sticky." It keeps you attached to a company's products and services. You're more loyal to companies that treat you well. Second, people talk. It used to be said that if you had a bad customer service experience you would tell seven people. The Internet changed that the stakes are a lot higher. Today we have YouTube, blogs, email, podcasts, chat sessions, clubs, groups, instant messaging, message boards, text messaging and more. Now, one bad service experience can be shared with thousands of people instantly. The same is true for positive experiences good news can be shared quickly and globally. Here's an example of service worth talking about. Dawn and I were celebrating our second wedding anniversary in Kauai, Hawaii. We were staying at the Hyatt Hotel. On the second day of our vacation, Dawn and I decided to go for a swim. When we finished our dip in the ocean we went back to our cabana and started to towel off. And then suddenly Dawn cried out, "Oh my gosh! Oh my gosh!" We both looked down at her hand. The two carat diamond on her engagement ring was gone. Two prongs were bent and two were missing. Dawn was crying and I did my best to comfort her. I told her, "We'll get another ring. It's just a symbol of what we have. And what we have is each other, and that's all that matters." Now don't get me wrong, I loved that ring it was hard to find and even harder to pay for. But now it was lost in the sand. Although I was pretty sure our diamond was gone forever, I asked the hotel staff to help us search for our diamond. To my surprise, they sent a small search party. Together we retraced our steps and combed the sand inch by inch in and around our cabana. After more than an hour, I called off the search. We tried our best, but the task was too great. While the ring had sentimental value, I knew the ring was insured. But our vacation wasn't. We needed to put the lost ring behind us. Now here's the rest of our story. Four days after we returned home, Dawn received a call. "Mrs. Pollay, this is Yvette from the Hyatt in Kauai." And the magic words were spoken: "We found it! We found your diamond, and we'll ship it out today." We couldn't believe it. How was it possible that Yvette and her team could find our diamond in the sand? They did it with incredible customer service, that's how. Each day at the start of their shift, the original search party sifted through the sand around the cabana. On the fourth day after we returned home, they found it. And they returned it! In all my years in customer service, I have neither experienced nor witnessed such service. Now to return to the question, "Does really good service matter?" Here are two reasons it does. First, because of the great service we experienced, I now choose Hyatt Hotels for more of my trips. Bottom line, their good service is sticky. Second, we talk. Dawn and I have told this story to hundreds of people, and to thousands more through my writing, seminars and speeches. And you're now one of them. Really good service does matter. Oh, and our ring, it now has six prongs.
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10/29/2010 1:12 PM
Change Your Seat, and Come to Life Everyone in life should be known for at least one quote. I have one that I would like to share with you. But first let me tell you a story. Seven years ago, I attended a three-day leadership conference in San Francisco. The first morning I arrived a few minutes early. There must have been a hundred people in the room. Many people were already sitting in their seats, and others were drinking coffee at the back of the room. But all had staked a claim on a seat for the day. There was just one chair left. I grabbed a cup of coffee and headed for it. The first day of the conference was good, and it was interesting to talk with the people around my table. The second day I left the house a little earlier so that I could sit in another part of the room and meet new people. The roads were pretty clear that morning. I arrived 30 minutes ahead of time. I put my bag down on a seat at a new table. Then I went to the back of the room to get a cup of coffee. Watching people arrive, I noticed that they were returning to the same seats that they had been sitting in the day before. I thought it was a bit curious, but I kept to my coffee and conversation. When it was time to take our seats, I looked around as I walked to my chair. And guess what I saw? Everyone in the room was in the same seat as they had been on day one, that is, except two people me, and a young man who was glaring at me for taking his seat. Out of 100 people, I was the only one who changed his seat on purpose! As I had planned, I learned a lot from the people around my new table. I had another good day. Day three came and my plan was the same. I left early from home so that I could arrive in time to choose a new seat in another part of the conference room. Unfortunately, traffic that morning was bumper to bumper my buffer time was lost on the highway. I arrived with five minutes to spare before the session started. I ran up the hotel stairs and opened the door to our meeting room. And what did I see? Everyone in the room was back in the seat they had chosen on day one, including the unhappy young man whose seat I had taken the day before. He was smiling at me as I settled into my original seat. He had the grin of victory all over his face. And the people I had met on day one again sitting next to me said, Welcome home. Everyone was so pleased that they had kept their original seat. It was at that moment I was reminded that most people dont like change. Most people prefer to stay in the same seat in life. They would rather be comfortable than extend themselves to meet new people and try new things. So now its time for my quote. Here it is: Most people sit in the same seat and expect life to come to them. Be different. Change your seat and you will come to life. Be willing to change your perspective. Be interested in other people. Be open to new ideas. The most successful people I know constantly challenge themselves. They talk to people with different ideas and they try new things. So today my question to you is, Where are you sitting? Better than that, Are you going to change your seat?
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10/29/2010 1:13 PM
Create Your Own Happy Hour Serve 3 for 1 Gratitude It was almost two years ago and I had just returned from a family vacation. I sat down at the computer to read my email. I had unplugged for a few days, and was hoping that no big issues were waiting for me. I started flipping through each one quickly. I was on the hunt for anything bad. You know that feeling. Its great to take a vacation, but youre afraid to return to a welcome party of problems. After reading through about 80 e-mails, I had not found any bad news. It was interesting to me that I did not feel good about it. I did not even feel relieved. I felt mostly empty the kind of feeling that leads you to grab a quart of ice cream and sit in front of the TV. It was then that I woke up. I said, What am I thinking? I just missed an opportunity! I was so focused on searching for the bad, that I was blind to the good. Much of the e-mail that I had received was actually full of positive news. So that night I started doing something differently. And I have been recommending it to others ever since. I call it Serve Three for One Gratitude. Heres how it works. When you receive good news via e-mail, voicemail, or in person stop and quickly think of three things for which you are grateful as a result of this news. Serving Three for One Gratitude makes you pause to take in the good news and recognize the positive impact it has on you. It also makes you more aware of all the people in your life who help make these good things happen. Why is this important? Consider the research of Psychologist Roy Baumeister. He found that people remember bad things more often than they do good things. If we do nothing to counter this, we are more likely to recall the bad in our life. If youre not sure Baumeister is right, think about this. How many good drivers did you see this week? How many times did you receive good service this week? How many times did people send helpful e-mails to you this week? If youre like most people and you remember anything at all, its probably not great. Serving Three for One Gratitude helps us combat our tendency to explain away or even dismiss the good things that happen in our lives. Positive Psychology co-founder Martin Seligman wrote in his book, Authentic Happiness, that Finding permanent and universal causes of good events . . . is the art of hope. This is key. Most of us do not search hard enough for what has contributed to our successes. When we explore the good events in our lives, we recognize how much help we have received from others. Psychology researcher Phillip Watkins found in his experiments that when you induce peoples gratitude, you can increase their positive emotion and ultimately their happiness. In another series of studies, psychology researchers Barbara Frederickson and Marcel Losada found that when business teams communicate with each other in a ratio of three positive and constructive comments to every negative and unproductive comment, they are predictably more successful. Psychologist John Gottman found in his research that newly married couples who communicate in a ratio of five positive comments to every one negative comment have happier and longer marriages. Shelly Gable further discovered that couples who respond with enthusiasm and curiosity to each others good news, which she calls active-constructive responding, report greater satisfaction in their marriages. Serving Three for One Gratitude gives you a chance to recognize and amplify the good things in your life, feel positive about them and experience gratitude for the people who are helping to make them possible. You get to savor the good in your life. Reflecting on the research of Loyola Psychologist Fred Bryant, Chris Peterson wrote in A Primer in Positive Psychology, those who habitually savor are indeed happier and more satisfied in general with life, more optimistic, and less depressed than those who do not savor. The next time you find yourself skipping over or discounting good news, youll know what to do. Take 10 seconds to lock in the positive. Match each piece of good news with
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10/29/2010 1:14 PM
three related things for which you are grateful, or people for whom you are grateful. Think of the impact it will have on your mood and attitude at the office, in the community and at home. Youll be creating your own happy hour every time you serve yourself Three for One Gratitude. Appreciate the good in your life. Be a regular at the Gratitude Bar.
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10/29/2010 1:14 PM
Lay Your Towel Down to Surpass Expectations and Ensure Your Success Many people lose their jobs. It happens every day. And when it does, many will ask why it happened to them. They will question how they could have been laid off or fired. Heres the most common reason: They did not surpass the expectations of their boss or organization. You are vulnerable at work if you are not certain that you are exceeding your objectives. When you leave your success open to interpretation someone could say that you are not performing you are ceding control of your career to someone else. This is a risky proposition for your career and for a good life. My dad told me a story 33 years ago that helped me successfully navigate through eight mergers, six reorganizations, two consolidations, three layoffs and 14 bosses in my career. Its the story of Jesse Owens, one of the greatest athletes in American history. Jesse Owens was competing in the long jump at the 1936 Olympics in Nazi Germany. Jesse was a track star from Ohio State University representing the Americans. And one of the competitors was Luz Long a blond, blue-eyed athlete from Germany. Hitler desperately wanted Long to win to support his propaganda for the "master" race. Jesse was AfricanAmerican. Jesse had to jump a qualifying distance of 24-and-a-half feet to make it to the long jump finals. As was his practice before the start of an official competition, Jesse took a practice jump dressed in his warm-up clothes. As he stepped out of the sand pit, the judges raised a red flag: The judges counted Jesses practice jump as his first official attempt. Jesse could not believe it. How could they count his practice jump? After all the reports he had heard of Germanys hatred for Jews and blacks, Jesse wondered if the German officials had made the call to help pave a victory for Long. In the meantime, Long qualified easily. Jesse knew that the qualifying jump was an easy one for him. He was the reigning world record holder. But he feared that the officials could take victory away from him with one more bad call. So, on his second attempt Jesse was extra cautious. And this time Jesse crossed the line, earning a second red flag from the judges. It was now down to one last jump. Jesse had to jump the qualifying distance to make it into the finals with Long. As Jesse kneeled in thought before his last jump, Long approached him. He put his hand on Jesses shoulder, looked at him, and told him to jump a half a foot behind the take-off board. If he did, Long advised that Jesse would eliminate the possibility that an official could disqualify him for fouling. Long then put his towel down at the exact spot from which Jesse should jump. Jesse did what Long said and left the towel in its place. Jesse then took off running down the runway for his final qualifying attempt. When he reached the towel, Jesse planted his foot right behind it in plain view of the judges, and jumped. Jesse landed, watched the officials measure his jump, looked up at the judges and waited with everyone for the news: He made it! And Jesse set an unofficial world record! The day of the finals Jesse and Long battled for the win. On Longs final jump of the day, he broke the world record and was one step away from the Gold Medal. Jesse had just one more jump to try and overtake Long. So Jesse readied himself for his final jump. He then sprinted down the runway and leapt high into the air. And to the astonishment of everyone in the stadium, Jesse landed nearly six inches beyond Longs final jump. Jesse set a new world record and earned the Gold Medal for the Americans. Jesse eventually earned four gold medals at the 1936 Olympics. While Hitler never personally acknowledged Jesses record-breaking feat, he received a ticker tape parade in New York City when he returned home. He was an international star and an American hero. Dads story about Jesse Owens taught me to never leave my success to someone elses judgment. Dont leave your career to chance. Find out what your organization expects of you. What do they want you to achieve (your results) and how do they want you to achieve it (your behaviors)? If they dont tell you, ask them. If they are not sure, ask others. Make sure you know what success means in your organization. Clearly surpass your goals. Lay your towel down.
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10/29/2010 1:16 PM
What Did You Say? Talking to Yourself Can Make You Happier My four-year-old daughter and I were walking through a nature preserve last year when she stopped, turned around and looked right up at me and said, Papi, what did you say? I said, Ah, nothing sweetie. But Papi, I heard you say something. Oh, Eliana, I must have been talking to myself. And then she asked me the big question, Papi, why were you talking to yourself? Why was I talking to myself? That was a great question. I didnt know. I didnt even know that I was doing it. While you might be smiling right now, you know you do it too. We all do it. If you dont believe me, try this quick exercise. Take a quick break and email me what you have read so far in this column. You can reach me at david@themomentumproject.com. OK? Stop! Now what are you saying to yourself? Why is he asking me to do this? I dont have time right now. I dont do exercises. Im not e-mailing a columnist. Thats all self-talk. As I said, we all do it. Everybody does. And we talk fast. We speak out loud at approximately 200 words per minute. Yet we speak to ourselves at more than 1,300 words per minute. At this rate we might have over 45,000 thoughts per day. The problem is that many of these thoughts arent helpful. What does this mean for us? Roy Baumeister, a leading psychology researcher from Florida State University, found in his research that people remember bad events more often than good events. So if we are more likely to remember the bad stuff, and we talk to ourselves at an incredible speed, how much of what we say to ourselves helps us live a better life? Are we more successful, and are we happier? Fifteen years ago my grandfather taught me that the answer can be yes if we choose what to say to ourselves. I was visiting my grandfather in his home in Augusta, Maine. We called him Bumpa. He was 86. Bumpa was having a rough morning, he was not feeling well. He had a right to feel bad, as he was a survivor of three major strokes. That morning I walked down the short hallway from the guest bedroom to the kitchen. I stopped when I heard his voice. I slowly peeked around the corner and I saw him sitting in his rocking chair. He was staring at his legs as he was saying, Legs dont fail me now. You can do it. Youve always been strong. I have a lot to do. Lets go legs, Im getting up. Thirty minutes later, Bumpa was outside in his backyard chopping wood. Here was a man the doctors thought we had lost three times. He lived to be 90 years old. My grandfather taught me the power of self-talk. Im at my best when I think about all the support I have, the strengths I have been given, the successes Ive had and the goals I have now. Im at my best when I choose what to think about. And it was my four-year-old daughters question that reminded me to choose the self-talk that will help me to live my best possible life. Eliana also helped me remember how much I loved and admired my grandfather.
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10/29/2010 1:17 PM
The Law of the Garbage Truck (Due to the popularity of this column, we are re-running it with additional material.) How often do you let other peoples nonsense change your mood? Do you let a bad driver, rude waiter, curt boss, or an insensitive employee ruin your day? Unless youre the Terminator, youre probably set back on your heels. However, the mark of your success is how quickly you can refocus on whats important in your life. Sixteen years ago I learned this lesson. And I learned it in the back of a New York City taxi cab. Heres what happened. I hopped in a taxi, and we took off for Grand Central Station. We were driving in the right lane when all of a sudden, a black car jumped out of a parking space right in front of us. My taxi driver slammed on his brakes, the car skidded, the tires squealed, and at the very last moment our car stopped just one inch from the other cars back-end. I couldnt believe it. But then I couldnt believe what happened next. The driver of the other car, the guy who almost caused a big accident, whipped his head around and started yelling bad words at us. How do I know? Ask any New Yorker, some words in New York come with a special face. And he even threw in a one finger salute. I couldnt believe it! But then heres what really blew me away. My taxi driver just smiled and waved at the guy. And I mean, he was friendly. So, I said, Why did you just do that!? This guy could have killed us! And this is when my taxi driver told me what I now call, The Law of the Garbage Truck. He said: Many people are like garbage trucks. They run around full of garbage, full of frustration, full of anger, and full of disappointment. As their garbage piles up, they look for a place to dump it. And if you let them, theyll dump it on you. So when someone wants to dump on you, dont take it personally. Just smile, wave, wish them well, and move on. Believe me. Youll be happier. So I started thinking, how often do I let Garbage Trucks run right over me? And how often do I take their garbage and spread it to other people at work, at home or on the street? It was then that I said, I dont want their garbage and Im not going to spread it anymore. I began to see Garbage Trucks. Like in the movie The Sixth Sense, the little boy said, I see Dead People. Well now I see Garbage Trucks. I see the load theyre carrying. I see them coming to dump it. And like my taxi driver, I dont take it personally. I just smile, wave, wish them well, and I move on. One of my favorite football players of all time was Walter Payton. Every day on the football field, after being tackled, he would jump up as quickly as he hit the ground. He never dwelled on a hit. Payton was ready to make the next play his best. Over the years the best players from around the world in every sport have played this way: Tiger Woods, Nadia Comaneci, Muhammad Ali, Bjorn Borg, Chris Evert, Michael Jordan, Jackie Robinson, and Pele are just some of those players. And the most inspiring leaders have lived this way: Nelson Mandela, Mother Theresa, Gandhi, and Martin Luther King. Roy Baumeister, a psychology researcher from the University of Florida, found in his extensive research that you remember bad things more often than good things in your life. You store the bad memories more easily, and you recall them more frequently. So the odds are against you when a Garbage Truck comes your way. But when you follow The Law of the Garbage Truck, you take back control of your life. You make room for the good by letting go of the bad. The best leaders know that they have to be ready for their next meeting. The best sales people know that they have to be ready for their next client. And the best parents know that they have to be ready to welcome their children home from school with hugs and kisses, no matter how many garbage trucks they might have faced that day. All of us know that we have to be fully present, and at our best for the people we care about. The bottom line is that successful people do not let Garbage Trucks take over their life.
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10/29/2010 1:19 PM
What about you? What would happen in your life, starting today, if you let more garbage trucks pass you by? Heres my bet: Youll be happier.
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10/29/2010 1:19 PM
The Law of the Garbage Truck (Due to the popularity of this column, we are re-running it with additional material.) How often do you let other peoples nonsense change your mood? Do you let a bad driver, rude waiter, curt boss, or an insensitive employee ruin your day? Unless youre the Terminator, youre probably set back on your heels. However, the mark of your success is how quickly you can refocus on whats important in your life. Sixteen years ago I learned this lesson. And I learned it in the back of a New York City taxi cab. Heres what happened. I hopped in a taxi, and we took off for Grand Central Station. We were driving in the right lane when all of a sudden, a black car jumped out of a parking space right in front of us. My taxi driver slammed on his brakes, the car skidded, the tires squealed, and at the very last moment our car stopped just one inch from the other cars back-end. I couldnt believe it. But then I couldnt believe what happened next. The driver of the other car, the guy who almost caused a big accident, whipped his head around and started yelling bad words at us. How do I know? Ask any New Yorker, some words in New York come with a special face. And he even threw in a one finger salute. I couldnt believe it! But then heres what really blew me away. My taxi driver just smiled and waved at the guy. And I mean, he was friendly. So, I said, Why did you just do that!? This guy could have killed us! And this is when my taxi driver told me what I now call, The Law of the Garbage Truck. He said: Many people are like garbage trucks. They run around full of garbage, full of frustration, full of anger, and full of disappointment. As their garbage piles up, they look for a place to dump it. And if you let them, theyll dump it on you. So when someone wants to dump on you, dont take it personally. Just smile, wave, wish them well, and move on. Believe me. Youll be happier. So I started thinking, how often do I let Garbage Trucks run right over me? And how often do I take their garbage and spread it to other people at work, at home or on the street? It was then that I said, I dont want their garbage and Im not going to spread it anymore. I began to see Garbage Trucks. Like in the movie The Sixth Sense, the little boy said, I see Dead People. Well now I see Garbage Trucks. I see the load theyre carrying. I see them coming to dump it. And like my taxi driver, I dont take it personally. I just smile, wave, wish them well, and I move on. One of my favorite football players of all time was Walter Payton. Every day on the football field, after being tackled, he would jump up as quickly as he hit the ground. He never dwelled on a hit. Payton was ready to make the next play his best. Over the years the best players from around the world in every sport have played this way: Tiger Woods, Nadia Comaneci, Muhammad Ali, Bjorn Borg, Chris Evert, Michael Jordan, Jackie Robinson, and Pele are just some of those players. And the most inspiring leaders have lived this way: Nelson Mandela, Mother Theresa, Gandhi, and Martin Luther King. Roy Baumeister, a psychology researcher from the University of Florida, found in his extensive research that you remember bad things more often than good things in your life. You store the bad memories more easily, and you recall them more frequently. So the odds are against you when a Garbage Truck comes your way. But when you follow The Law of the Garbage Truck, you take back control of your life. You make room for the good by letting go of the bad. The best leaders know that they have to be ready for their next meeting. The best sales people know that they have to be ready for their next client. And the best parents know that they have to be ready to welcome their children home from school with hugs and kisses, no matter how many garbage trucks they might have faced that day. All of us know that we have to be fully present, and at our best for the people we care about. The bottom line is that successful people do not let Garbage Trucks take over their life.
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10/29/2010 1:19 PM
What about you? What would happen in your life, starting today, if you let more garbage trucks pass you by? Heres my bet: Youll be happier.
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10/29/2010 1:19 PM
Keep Your Plan in Your Hands Not in Your Drawer I learned many years ago how hard it is to stick to a plan. I had just started my new job at MasterCard in New York City. I was attending my first strategic planning meeting. All the top leaders of the division were there. Bill was one of them (name changed for this story). In the middle of the morning session Bill yelled out, Why are we wasting so much time on this plan? You know where were going to put it after the conference? Not being afraid to speak his mind, Bill answered his own question. Its going to go in the drawer with all the rest of our annual plans! I admit that was a better answer than the one I had feared. There are two conclusions you might draw from this story: 1) The plan wasnt good; or 2) No one really looks at plans. In our case the plan was good. All our top leaders participated in the planning meeting. Every department was represented. We had customer feedback, consulting input and an extensive review of our opportunities and threats in the marketplace. The plan was good. But Bill was right. Many people did not look at the plan again, the plan went into the drawer. So why didnt more people look at the plan again? The answer is simple. They forgot about the plan. They left the plan in the drawer, not in their hands. So how do you know if your plan will work if you cannot remember it? A good plan points you in the right direction. And a good plan does more than that. Anthropologist Lionel Tiger of Rutgers University has written that it affects your mood or attitude about the future. If you believe that you have a plan that will work, you are more optimistic. Your attitude is more positive. The late University of Kansas positive psychologist Rick Snyder found in his research that hope is directly connected to the belief that you can achieve your goals. Your goals encourage you to do things each day that are important to your future. You create your future by acting today. Good plans are worth reviewing many times: They guide our actions and behaviors. Take marriage for example. We all know that the divorce rate in this country is about 50 percent. What about second or third marriages? Its even worse. The divorce rate is 67 percent for second marriages and 74 percent for third marriages. Yet, probably all of us who walked down the aisle recited the most famous marriage plan ever written our wedding vows. But most of us have said them only once. Could you imagine if everyone reviewed their vows and remained committed to them every day? Finally, a plan is not a map, its a guide. Its a guide to our goals based on what we know today. And when our information changes, we should review our plan and adjust it as needed. Most company leaders treat their plans as if they should be bound in leather, or framed in glass. The most successful leaders instead write all over their plan. They scratch out what is out of date and they scribble in what needs to be added. Then they communicate the changes to everyone who needs to know. They build support for the changes, and ask for help in achieving them. So keep your plan in your hands, not in your drawer. I know Bill would be impressed.
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10/29/2010 1:19 PM
Real Thanksgiving is Personal, Right Down to the Smudged Signature Our national day of gratitude, Thanksgiving, is just a few days away. Christmas, Chanukah and Kwanzaa are just two to five weeks later. Good leadership involves good planning. If youre a business leader, start thinking about your gratitude plan now. Someone in your company, maybe even you, is going to place an order for holiday cards soon. Stop the order! If you were planning to send generic, non-personal cards, dont waste your time. Your customers are too busy to open and read messages that have little thought and no personal meaning behind them. Generic cards send messages you dont want to send. Heres what they communicate: Even though you spend thousands of dollars as a customer of our company, I am having someone on my staff send you this generic card. I dont have time to tell you how your business with us makes a difference in the lives of our employees and many others. I dont even have time to sign this card. So have a happy holiday and tape this great card to your wall! Buck this terrible trend! Get personal. Tell your customers how much they mean to you. Tell them why their business matters. And make sure your letters pass the lick test. Your signature should smudge when someones wet finger runs across it. If it doesnt, youre showing again that you dont care enough to even know whats being sent to your customers. Your photocopied signature says, I dont value you enough to personally sign my letters. I laugh every time I hear people say, I dont have time to write personal thank you notes. I have an easy answer for them. They should send a blanket letter or email to all of their customers and everyone else they know at the beginning of the year. Heres what they could write: I am way too busy to thank you personally for anything youre planning on doing for me this year. As I would prefer not to have the burden of thanking you for going out of your way for making my life better, please dont do anything especially nice for me. Dont give me presents. Dont help me with my projects. Dont open doors for me. Just cut me out of the picture. That way I will have no need to spend time personally thanking you. Heres another great excuse I hear people give: They know I appreciate what they did for me. Maybe they do, and maybe they dont. The number one reason people leave their companies is because of their bosses. Typically the employees who leave feel underappreciated they dont feel that their bosses have appropriately recognized their contribution to the company. People leave marriages for similar reasons, they feel that their spouse does not value them. One of the greatest gifts we can give others is the gift of appreciation for what they contribute to our lives. The best companies know this. Leaders know that companies are simply a web of individuals who coordinate their work on behalf of the company. All employees are just people they want to be appreciated by their bosses, peers, direct reports and customers. So as you begin making plans for the holiday season at work and at home, set enough time aside to thank people personally for everything they did to make your life better this past year. Youll feel good that you did, and you can bet they will appreciate your gratitude even more.
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10/29/2010 1:20 PM
Increase Your Happiness. Build Gratitude Chains in Your Life Everything good that happens in this world is the result of a chain of events. No matter the size, each event has a history of activity. Unfortunately, most of us are unaware of the many good chains in our lives. Consider the last time you opened a can of beans. Did you think about who planted them, picked them, packed them, shipped them, stocked them and sold them to you? Heres the response I most often get when I ask that question, Ahhh, no. We just open the can, throw the beans on our plate, pop them in the microwave, grab a fork, and start eating them as soon as the plate is put on the table. We dont see the chain, we just see the beans. My mom knows about beans, and she understands the chain. Mom picked beans growing up in Maine. During the summer Mom and her sister would walk down the hill from their home to the Kennebec River, pay 10 cents for someone to ferry them across the river in a rowboat, and then head for the bus that would take them to the farm where the beans were grown. Mom would spend all day in the hot sun picking string beans, earning $10 per week. Then the beans were washed, packed and shipped to nearby grocery stores. So when Mom sits down to eat string beans, she appreciates the chain. Her awareness of all the people and effort that it takes to get beans from the farm to her plate makes her feel grateful. And thats a good thing. Gratitude is one of the most potent psychological contributors to happiness. Robert Emmons, psychology professor at the University of California Davis, demonstrated in his research that grateful people are happier. In his new book, Thanks! How the New Science of Gratitude Can Make You Happier, Emmons wrote, Our groundbreaking research has shown that grateful people experience higher levels of positive emotions such as joy, enthusiasm, love, happiness and optimism, and that the practice of gratitude as a discipline protects a person from the destructive impulses of envy, resentment, greed and bitterness. The challenge then is for us to find ways of becoming more grateful. One powerful way to increase your gratitude is by increasing the number of what I call Gratitude Chains in your life. Gratitude Chains are made up of links of appreciation for what contributes to the people and things we care about. Here are the four keys to building Gratitude Chains: Cultivate Awareness Everyday look around you and take note of what you value. What and who do you appreciate in your life? Write down what you observe (i.e., your spouse, your children, your job, your daily meals, your friends, your country, your car, your home, the customer service you receive, the coffee you drink, etc.). Cultivate Curiosity Learn more about each person or item on your list. How do these people do what they do each day? What contributes to these important things in your life? Ask questions, study and research. Do whatever you have to do in order to better understand what and whom you treasure. Cultivate Memory You feel grateful only for what you remember. Practice recalling the most important people and things you care about in your life. Recite them in the morning. Add them to your prayers. Reflect on them each day. Thank them. Weave Your Gratitude Chains Together There is power in the Gratitude Chain. The more we know about the people and things that matter to us in our lives, the more likely we will feel grateful. View your life as Gratitude Chains woven together. The gratitude you feel in one part of your life will connect to and energize the other areas. And remember all it takes is a can of beans and your Gratitude Chain to brighten your day. My wife Dawn told me recently that she plans to plant a garden with our little girls, Ariela (4) and Eliana (5). Dawn wants to carry forward the Gratitude Chain in our family. And Dawn called my mom to tell her what she intends to plant first: Beans.
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10/29/2010 1:21 PM
Appreciate Your Loved Ones With a Gratitude Chain The second in a three-part series on building gratitude in your life. Last week I told you that when you increase your gratitude in life, you become happier and more successful. And I shared with you that one way to amplify your gratitude is to build Gratitude Chains. You cultivate three things in the process of building a Gratitude Chain: 1) Awareness of what and for whom you are grateful; 2) Curiosity about what they do that makes you grateful, or what makes something you value possible; and 3) Memory of what is good about these individuals or things by engaging in gratitude practices. And when you link together your Gratitude Chains, you experience a powerful appreciation of the important people and things in your life. So lets look at a Gratitude Chain applied to your personal life. You can start with your spouse, your boyfriend or girlfriend, or a friend. If you do not fully appreciate what they do and how they do it every day, step into their world. Heres an example of a Gratitude Chain I created for my wife Dawn. Step 1: Cultivate Awareness. My wife Dawn drives our daughters, Eliana (5) and Ariela (4), 30-40 minutes each way to school, Monday through Friday. She often has to make two round-trips because the girls get out of school at different times. My girls receive the education we want for them because Dawn makes the drive every day. I did not truly experience gratitude for what she does until I made the trip a number of times myself. I became aware. I also did not fully understand the demands of a mothers role until I spent entire days, morning until bedtime, with the girls. My gratitude increased when I realized how much love, patience, and stamina Dawn shows every day. In fact, I have an appreciation for all moms. I became aware. Step 2: Cultivate Curiosity. I asked Dawn how she manages every morning to bathe, dress, feed, brush hair, put on sunscreen, make lunches, fill backpacks and put on shoes for the girls so quickly. I wanted to know her secret (because truthfully, it takes me twice as long to do the same thing). I asked about her system for accomplishing everything. I learned the steps, but more importantly, I learned how much love, care and thought Dawn puts into each day with the girls. I became curious. Step 3: Cultivate Memory. Every morning when I wake up I start my day by reciting everything I am grateful for, and Dawn is at the top of my list. My morning gratitude ritual helps me keep fresh in my mind all that Dawn does for our family each day. And I look for opportunities to recognize Dawn, big and small. One of my practices is to write her a note each day. My notes congratulate or thank her. And they always say that I love her. I commit my gratitude to memory by practicing gratitude everyday. I remember. Link Your Gratitude Chains Together. Gratitude Chains help to embed in your subconscious positive thoughts and feelings about who and what you care about they keep your mind focused on recognizing everyone and everything important to you. And the more Gratitude Chains you have, the more you have the opportunity to influence your happiness. What if you created a Gratitude Chain every week? Could you imagine?! You would have at least 52 people or things in your life that would make you feel grateful.
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10/29/2010 1:21 PM
Build Your Business with Gratitude Chains The third in a three-part series on building gratitude in your life and business. Our three-part series on gratitude has focused on building Gratitude Chains in your life to increase your happiness. Today were going to focus on how you can create Gratitude Chains to support your business. Remember that you create Gratitude Chains in your life when you cultivate three things: 1) awareness of what and for whom you are grateful, 2) curiosity about what they do that makes you feel grateful, or what makes something you value possible, and 3) memory of what is good about these individuals or things by engaging in gratitude practices. I interviewed Arthur J. Kobacker earlier this year in his home. Art was 83 when he passed away on July 12, 2007. He was a philanthropist with his wife Sara Jo. One of Arts most personally rewarding endeavors involved providing the initial funding (and supplemental annual funds) to build and support The Village Academy, a K-12 school in the heart of Delray Beach, Floridas inner city. Art was also a successful businessman who sold his Kobacker Shoe Company (679 stores in 31 states) in 1994 to Payless ShoeSource Inc. In our two-hour interview, Art shared some of his experiences in business and in life. Art believed in the importance of building Gratitude Chains in business (although he used his own words to describe the idea). He believed that successful business leaders should always connect directly with their customers and their employees. So lets look at a Gratitude Chain focused on business. And well include Arts insights to illustrate each part of the Gratitude Chain building process. Step 1: Cultivate Awareness Spend time in your stores. Visit your customer service centers. Art told me about a time when an international group of businessmen arrived for a week-long visit with him, but they arrived on the wrong week. Art was out of town visiting a store. So Arts office called his wife Sara Jo to ask if she knew where he was. Art said, I remember my wife started calling stores . . . and she reached the store in Portsmouth, Virginia, talked to a very nice store manager, and she said, Is Mr. Kobacker there? And he said, No, hes not. And had he been there? No. Is he expected? And this manager said, He is always expected. Step 2: Cultivate Curiosity Ask your customers what they value. Ask them what they like best about your products and services. Ask them what they would like you to improve. Talk to your employees. Ask them how they best take care of your customers. Ask them what helps them support your customers the most, and what makes it hard for them to do their job. Art said to me, If you ask the right questions, you get the right answers, and you find out where you are making mistakes and where you are doing things that are right, and how you might expand on them. And I just learned a whole lot from doing that. Visiting stores, meeting with people, and the store employees, and the store manager, and talking to customers were the high points of my retail experience. Step 3: Cultivate Memory Recognize publicly and privately the employees who best service your customers. Include great service stories in your talks and interviews spread the word that customer service is prized in your company. And pay personal visits to your best employees. We had a particular store manager by the name of Bob Mallick, Art remembered. And he was . . . in Belle Vernon, Pennsylvania in a Picway Shoe Store, and I used to say at various times, Lets fly to Belle Vernon and worship at the seat of Bob Mallick. So here we would come flying in on a plane with our head of store operations, and our regional vice president, and the district supervisor for that area, and the mens buyer, and the womens shoe buyer, and the childrens shoe buyer, etc. And we would all arrive in the store, and we would ask Bob
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10/29/2010 1:22 PM

we would all arrive in the store, and we would ask Bob Mallick, What do you need? Art concluded, I always felt that I could learn so much from a store manager who had to deal with the customer every day, all day long. Gratitude Chains Build Your Business The best leaders build Gratitude Chains in their business. They make it clear what they value. Arthur J. Kobacker knew how to build Gratitude Chains in business. And the beauty of Art was that he knew how to build Gratitude Chains at home and in the community. Increase your gratitude: Build Gratitude Chains in business and in life.
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10/29/2010 1:22 PM
Hows Your Momentum? Recently, many of you asked, Why is it so hard to maintain positive momentum in our lives? Others asked me more specifically, How can we create and keep momentum in our careers? Positive momentum is the key to success in business and to happiness in life. Most of us say that we want momentum; we want to be on a roll in life. The problem is that many of us struggle with momentum once we experience it. I remember skiing for the first time. I was 17 years old. I was in Wisconsin at one of the states two hills. I had just finished my first ski lesson with a group of firstgraders. I thought, If they can do it, I can do it. I was ready to take on the hill. I jumped on the chair lift and rode to the top. I hopped off the ride and looked down. My goal was to ski the hill without falling. And off I went. Ten feet, 20 feet, 40 feet, 80 feet, and I was still on my skis! One hundred feet, 200 feet, 400 feet, and I was still standing. Seconds later I was one quarter of the way down the mountain and I was still going! And then all of a sudden I started to worry. I started thinking, What if I hit someone, what if I veer off the path, what if I go too fast, what if I cant stop, what if, what if . . . ? And before I knew it I had decided Id had enough. Unfortunately, I forgot how to stop, so I dove into the snow like a B-Movie stuntman. I landed face first and my skis went flying. Even though my face was freezing, my knees were hurting, my skis were sliding down the hill and the first-graders were sailing past me, I was relieved. I no longer had to worry about what could have happened as a result of all my momentum. I had stopped it all together. Most of us have experienced something like this in our lives. Momentum can be scary. It not only moves us more quickly to our goals, it often carries us past our goals. It launches us into a new world of possibilities, many of which are unfamiliar to us. We are initially excited about the abundance that comes with momentum, but then we begin to fear our increasing level of performance. We are afraid that it could lead us to something for which we may not be prepared, or that we are not expecting, or that we may not like when we get there. The good news is that achieving and experiencing momentum in our lives does not have to be threatening. The power of positive momentum can help us achieve our goals more efficiently, with less effort, and without negative stress. We will be challenged, but not anxious. We will have people and processes set up to help us stay on a roll. When we have the right support and focus, positive momentum will lead us to realize our dreams. Next week I will share with you THE KEY TEST of Momentum, a guide for building and maintaining momentum in your career. I will then teach you how to build a Momentum Map of Success. Thank you for all your questions and stories. Keep them coming!
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10/29/2010 1:22 PM
Take the Key Test of Momentum Last week I wrote about the power of positive momentum in your life. This week I want to share with you my guide for assessing and building momentum in your career. THE KEY TEST of Momentum will help you understand what drives your career momentum. THE KEY TEST is a 10-point guide to help you focus your strengths, passion and resources on living your best possible life. Grab a pencil now and take THE KEY TEST to see if you are experiencing positive momentum. For each of the 10 dimensions of momentum, rate yourself on a scale of one to five. Five means that youre at the top of the dimension, and a one means that you are at the low end of the scale. Here goes: (1) I am always Thinking about new ideas and creative opportunities I can pursue in my career. I do not hesitate to ask for Help. Many people mentor and advise me. My Ethics and values are in harmony with my work. My work makes a positive difference in the world. I am constantly increasing my Knowledge by reading, researching and studying. I am an expert in my field. I seek as much Experience as possible; I want to learn by doing. I Yearn for the opportunity to do even more of my work. I love what I do. I am eager to Try new things. I am willing to experiment.
(2)
(3)
(4)
(5)
(6)
(7)
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I am Energized by my work. While others fatigue easily, my battery is continually charging. I use my most natural Strengths every day on the job. I get to do what I do best.
(9)
(10) I am constantly in Training. I am always on the lookout for a new insight, or a new approach that will help me perform at a higher level. Heres how to score THE KEY TEST of Momentum. If you scored a five on dimensions one, three, six, eight, and nine, you are on the right career path; you love what you do. These questions reflect who you are. You will be successful because you use your most natural strengths every day, you are energized by what you do, you yearn to do what you love all of the time and you feel that your work is meaningful. If you did not score a four or five on the dimensions above, you should work on re-crafting your work to better align with your natural strengths and passion. If you scored a three or lower, you should re-evaluate your decision to pursue your current career. You will never compete at the highest level if your heart is not in your chosen profession. You will never reach the top if you cannot fully tap your most natural strengths. Now turn your attention to questions two, four, five, seven and 10. These questions reflect what you do with your natural talent, interest and passion. People who love their chosen career want advice, help and coaching to make them better. They look for learning and training opportunities to advance their knowledge in the field. They seek new experiences to test and build their skill. Wherever you scored less than a five in these dimensions you should redouble your effort. Your momentum will increase as result. And your life will become more meaningful, gratifying and fun! Next week I will share with you how to tap your best self to further increase your momentum.
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10/29/2010 1:23 PM
The Map to Your Own Momentum for Success How can I create momentum in my life? Ive had good momentum in the past, but I lost it. And now I dont know how to get it back. This is a question I hear a lot. People want momentum in their lives and they are surprised when they lose it. The challenge for most of us is to discover and understand what contributes to our personal momentum. One key to finding the answer is to create what I call a Momentum Map of your life. Heres how it works. Grab a blank sheet of paper and a pencil. In the bottom left corner of the page draw a small circle. In the top right corner of the paper draw another small circle. Now draw a line between them. This line represents your life to date. The left circle marks your birth and the right circle represents where you are today. Turn the page over and think about your major successes in your life. What have you achieved? What times in your life were the most gratifying and meaningful? Spend 10 minutes listing these accomplishments and experiences. Turn the page back over and plot on your timeline all of these important events and experiences in your life. Place a mark and the approximate date on the timeline when the events occurred, and just below them write a two-to-three word description of each achievement. Then look at the timeline. Choose any period of time when you felt that you were really on a roll when you were experiencing momentum. Now identify what I call your Momentum Accelerators. Grab another sheet of paper. Think back to this time of achievement and satisfaction. What did you do back then that helped you succeed? What practices did you employ every day? How did you learn? Who was around to help you? How did you use your strengths? Write all these things down. These are the actions that fueled your success. Heres the last step in the Momentum Map process. Get a new sheet of paper. Write out the major goals you plan to achieve over the next nine years. What are you going to do and when? Then turn over your page and draw a line just as you did before, from the bottom left corner to the top right corner of the page. This new line represents the next nine years of your life. Place marks along your new timeline when you expect that you will reach your objectives. Write two-to-three word descriptions for each of these achievements below the marks. For the purpose of this exercise, write down the first accomplishment you expect to realize in your future. Your task is to answer this question: How will I ensure that I create enough momentum in my life to achieve this goal? The answer can be found in your past. Look at your list of Momentum Accelerators. Are you tapping them fully now? If not, put them back into use. You know how to succeed. You have before. Write down what youre going to do now. Most people look to others for motivation. Momentum builders do the opposite. They first look inside themselves for the excellence that is within. This is their foundation. Then they go outside to build the support they need to achieve their goals. Your Momentum Map will help you create and sustain your exciting future by first leveraging your successful past. Your momentum is yours to create. Enjoy it! And remember to tell me about it.
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10/29/2010 1:24 PM
How to Boost Your Momentum in 2008 The Formula The follow-up to my three-part series. Hows my momentum? is the question we should ask ourselves every day. For the last three weeks we have focused on answering this question. Todays column is a follow-up to our three-part series. How do you know you have momentum? You experience momentum when opportunities related to your passion in life appear faster than you could have imagined. You catch yourself saying, This is the most fun Ive ever had! Or, I can barely keep up with all the possibilities! Others will also let you know that you have momentum. Youll hear them saying things like, Youre on a roll! Or, Youre career is in high gear! Or, You are unstoppable! The physics formula for momentum states that mass multiplied by velocity equals momentum. The more mass you have and the higher your velocity, the more momentum you experience. In my treatment of momentum your mass is who you are. The more you bring of your most natural talent, passion, and energy to your work, the greater your mass. You are a giant when you tap your best self in your work. We should all strive to do work that allows us to tap our greatest strengths. Your velocity is what you do with your mass. When you ask for help, when you partner with others, when you continually receive training, when you practice what you do, when you are willing to try new things, you increase your velocity. Your speed of achievement increases when you focus on activities that multiply the power of your best self. One of the most powerful ways that you can build momentum is to match your natural strengths and passion with an expertise. Becoming an expert in the field you love will put you in very small company. Why? First, most people do not do what they love. Second, most people do not want to put in the time and effort it takes to become an expert. Anders Ericsson, a psychologist at Florida State University, found in his research that 10,000 hours of study is required to be a top expert. To give you an idea how that would translate into daily living, I did some math. If you studied four hours a day for seven years with no breaks on the weekend, and no vacations, you would reach 10,000 hours. Ericsson said that the least accomplished experts in his study spent a minimum of 5,000 hours on their craft. If you figured this number for your target, and you kept your weekends free, you would study for four hours a day for five years. The bottom line is simple. You better love what you are doing if youre going to spend that much time doing it. New York University psychology professor Amy Wrzesniewski describes people whose work is pleasurable, enjoyable and fulfilling as having a calling. Wrzesniewskis research showed that people who have a calling have the highest life and job satisfaction of all employees. She also found that people with a calling miss the fewest days of work. It makes sense. We dont want to miss doing what we love! In our terms, people with a calling have momentum. They love their work; it is not just a job. We might say that people with a calling have greater mass. They do what they love and focus on bringing out their best self. And people with a calling have greater velocity. They do whatever it takes to help them achieve their goals. The most successful people know how to build and keep momentum. Get your momentum and enjoy your best possible life!
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10/29/2010 1:24 PM
Agree on What Success Looks Like; Youll Be Happy You Did Be clear on whats expected of you in your job. Agree on what success looks like. Dont be shy. Ask how youre going to be judged. I learned how important that was when I interned for Procter and Gamble in the summer of 1986. I wanted my own apartment near the office, but my budget was too tight. I could only afford to rent a room in a suburban home. Well call the owner of the home Mrs. Johnson. In order to reduce the rent that was advertised, I suggested to Mrs. Johnson that I could cut her lawn during the summer. She agreed, and I moved in the next day my first day on the job with Procter and Gamble. I worked hard that first week, logging more than 70 hours. When Friday night came around, I was tired. After dinner I went straight to bed. Now do you ever get the sense that someone is staring at you? You can tell without even opening your eyes, or looking in their direction. Well, the next morning I had that feeling . . . and then I heard a voice. David, its time to get up. It was Mrs. Johnson. She said it again, David, its time to get up. It was 7 a.m. on a Saturday. I said, What? Why? Mrs. Johnson answered in a cheery, but demanding voice, Its time to get up and mow the lawn and clean the pool. I couldnt believe it! First, why is Mrs. Johnson waking me up to do my chores at 7 a.m.? Second, when did I get assigned to clean the pool? And third, what is Mrs. Johnson doing in my room? The answer to these questions is simple: This is what you get when you dont clarify and agree on expectations in a business relationship. So, you can bet I quickly sorted out my agreement with Mrs. Johnson. And we put it in writing. We discussed my job (mowing the lawn), how it should be done (cut medium length with the lawnmower tracks running east to west), and when it should be completed (by 5 p.m. each Sunday). My summer with Mrs. Johnson taught me the importance of setting and agreeing upon business outcomes with your boss, your employees, your suppliers and your customers. There should be no surprises, unless theyre good ones. Define the right outcomes and then let each person find his own route toward these outcomes. This was one of the key findings of two Gallup Organization studies involving over 80,000 managers and more than 1 million employees. Managers who followed this principle were the most successful in the Gallup study. Marcus Buckingham and Curt Coffman (Gallup consultants at the time) related the results of this research in First, Break All the Rules. Buckingham and Coffman wrote: Keep the focus on outcomes: The role of a company is to identify the desired end. The role of the individual is to find the best means possible to achieve that end. Therefore strong companies become experts in the destination and give the individual the thrill of the journey. Take the guesswork out of success; agree on how it will be measured. If you dont, youll have someone like Mrs. Johnson waking you up someday.
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10/29/2010 1:25 PM
Your Children Are Sponges: What Beliefs Are They Absorbing? Here are the highlights from last nights dinner with my family. When I arrived home from the office, Dawn and the girls were in the kitchen. The first thing I did was hug and kiss Dawn. Then I found Eliana and Ariela they had gone into hiding when they heard the front door and I hugged and kissed them too (after a little joyful tickling). I then grabbed my daughters and bounced them in my arms as I sang our special song. (Its a simple song: Im so happy to see you! Im so happy to see you! Immmm soooo happy!). Next, we sat down together for dinner. We held hands and said our prayers, and we ended our blessings with a loud, and in unison, Aaaamen! We ate the food on our plates vegetables included and then we enjoyed a little dessert. And along the way, we talked about the fun and important things that happened that day for each of us. (Real or imaginary, four and five year-olds are fun to talk to!). Why do we do these things? Why do we perform these rituals every night? Daniel Gilbert, Harvard psychologist and author of Stumbling on Happiness, wrote, Just as we pass along our genes in an effort to create people whose faces look like ours, so too do we pass along our beliefs in an effort to create people whose minds think like ours. We want our children to share our values and beliefs and to demonstrate them in their behaviors. Almost anytime we tell anyone anything, Gilbert says, we are attempting to change the way their brains operate attempting to change the way they see the world so that their view of it closely resembles our own. I would add that any time we do anything in front of someone, we are transmitting a belief. I kiss and hug Dawn in front of the girls because I want them to believe their mother is loved, respected and appreciated. I hug, kiss and sing to my girls because I want them to believe that they are loved and that they bring joy to my life. I make sure we hold hands and have fun saying Amen when we pray, so that the girls enjoy saying thanks for everything that is good in their lives. But what did checking my e-mail 20 minutes after dinner say? What belief was I communicating? My diving right into e-mail said that my work was more important than family time. It also said that when my girls get older, it will be OK for them to run off after dinner and plunge into e-mail, Facebook or MySpace. And when I thought about this before I went to bed, I said to myself, I dont want my girls to hold these beliefs. E-mail can wait. Family time is more important. From now on, no more e-mail during family time. I want my girls to see that I value my time with them and Dawn. And I want them to believe that family time is meaningful, interesting and fun. How about you? What beliefs do you want your children to have? What beliefs do you believe will help make them happier, kinder and more successful? What are you saying and doing to transmit these good and powerful beliefs? Whatever good things that you are doing, keep doing them. Your children need to hear and see them. And what are you doing that undercuts the beliefs that you want your children to have? Make sure that you start removing your contradictory language and behavior from your daily routine. Our children are sponges. Lets give them something positive to absorb.
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10/29/2010 1:25 PM
Rigid Criteria for a Beautiful Day? Its a glorious day! My moms father would say this at the start of every day. And when my father gets up in the morning and looks outside, he says, Its another beautiful day in South Florida. My grandfathers and my fathers criteria for happiness at the beginning of each day are simple: Just wake up and look outside things are great. Now, consider youre up for a raise and you believe you deserve it. Youre sitting with your boss as she is sharing her evaluation of your performance over the past year. After reviewing your many accomplishments, she stops, looks at you and says, I am not giving you a raise. I am not happy with your performance. And you say, What? Why not? I accomplished a lot this year! Your boss says, I know. You say, Then why arent you giving me a raise? She says, Im not sure. Im just not happy with your performance. Now, how would that work for you? I know the answer: You would be furious! Its obvious what your issue would be with your boss. Your boss is using some criteria that she cannot even explain. How can you ever succeed if you dont know what her secret criteria are? Lets change up the example a little. Pretend this time that you have a boss who has precise expectations of you. He uses a 100-item evaluation for your performance. And as he shares his evaluation of your work with you, he acknowledges your outstanding attitude, behaviors and accomplishments. At the end of the review, your boss says, Nope. You scored 96 out of 100. No promotion. You say, What? After all Ive done, how can you hold back my promotion because I missed four things out of 100? Thats ridiculous! Let me jump from this example to your own happiness. Are you happy? Now, if your answer is yes, are you really happy, or sort of happy? And if I asked you these questions again in one year, what would your answers be? Happy? Unhappy? Sort of happy? How will you know? Your answer depends on the criteria that you use to judge your happiness. The question is, Do you know what your criteria are? And if you have criteria to determine your happiness, how rigid are they? Do you begin your day feeling good like my father or grandfather, or do you have a huge checklist that has to be completed before you declare that you are happy? Take this question further into your life. Think of someone you love. Do they make you happy? And what do they have to do to make you happy? How clear in your mind are your criteria? Are they fair? Are they too strict? You may be unknowingly acting as your hypothetical boss and giving bad evaluations based upon unclear criteria or criteria that are too narrow. See, if you hold up your loved ones to an Olympic level standard, you may never be happy. Im not suggesting you should discount what you value most in your relationship. I am saying that there may be a handful of truly unimportant things that you are letting limit your happiness and your satisfaction within an important relationship. Valuing happiness is a good thing. Most of us do. Understanding and establishing purposeful and reasonable criteria by which you judge your happiness are equally important. One final note: How rigidly do you want other people to judge you? Do you want them to score you on a 100-point checklist and expect a near perfect score? I know the answer. No. You want your loved ones to cut you some slack and support you. So, do the same for others in your life. Youll be happier and so will they. Have a glorious and beautiful day!
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10/29/2010 1:26 PM
To Predict Your Future, Look at Your Beliefs For as long as I can remember, peoples behavior has intrigued me. I have always wondered why people do what they do. When I was still in elementary school in Shorewood, Wisconsin, I often daydreamed about how I could help classmates who were struggling. I would imagine how I could change their lives for the better if they allowed me to help guide their decisions. I would think about all the things that I would do if I were in their shoes: I would be friendlier; I would study harder; I would exercise; I would hang out with other kids; and I would believe that I could change, and that I could make my life better. See, I believed that people could change their lives if they just made different choices and adopted new beliefs. So you can imagine why my favorite movie when I was growing up was the Academy Award-winning movie Heaven Can Wait (1978) with Warren Beatty and Julie Christie. The premise of the movie was that Joe Pendleton (Warren Beatty) was a backup quarterback who wanted to lead his Los Angeles Rams football team to the Super Bowl. During a training ride on his bicycle, he was mistakenly thought to have died in a traffic accident. The mistake was made by an overzealous angel (Buck Henry) who plucked him from earth prematurely. Henrys heavenly boss (James Mason) set out to correct the mistake by helping Joe find someone who was about to expire and then place Joe in his body. The idea was that Joe would then live the remainder of his preordained life in his new body. Joes challenge was that he had to achieve his goals in the body and life of another person. Heres what captivated me: Our beliefs direct our lives. If we believe that we can do something and we are determined to do it, we can achieve great things. While Joe inherited someones body, life and relationships, his character and his beliefs were still his. Joe was intent on returning to professional football no matter what it took: His conviction transcended the body and life he occupied. So it was no surprise at the end of the movie that . . . (Ill let you rent the movie to find out for yourself. Its worth renting.) Ill just conclude by saying that Joes beliefs were critical to his success. Steven Pinker wrote in his book How the Mind Works: In our daily lives we all predict and explain other peoples behavior from what we think they know and what we think they want. Pinker said you dont need a mathematical model to predict the majority of human acts . . . you can just ask your grandmother. Pinker makes the point that your beliefs and desires underlie your behavior. If you want to know what you are going to achieve in your life, you must find out what your deep-down, unconscious beliefs are. So, what are your beliefs? Which of your beliefs are helping you bring out your best? And which of your beliefs are outdated, or are limiting you? Unlike Warren Beatty in Heaven Can Wait, you have only one body you can count on to live out your life. The question, then, is what beliefs are directing you? If you want to predict your future, look at your beliefs.
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10/29/2010 1:26 PM
Get Naked Again! Re-Start Your Life I was born naked. I know. Ive seen the pictures. My daughters were born naked. I know. I took the pictures. Everyone is born naked. I know. I saw all the babies in the nursery. There is nothing more beautiful and more precious than a baby girl or boy. Babies stir something deep inside all of us. They bring out our most profound emotions. Babies also evoke our optimism; they represent possibility. Who will they become? What will they do? Who will they marry? Where will they live? There is nothing like looking into the eyes of a newborn baby. All you see is love and potential. And then life begins. You become aware of your environment. You meet the people who will take care of you. You live with them. You get to know the people in your community. You begin to learn the rules. You find out what is expected of you at home, in school, in your social network, in your community and at work. You recognize through experience that there are rewards for doing certain things, punishments for doing other things and a lack of interest for much of the rest. And then one day you wonder who you really are. You wonder why you do what you do, feel what you feel and say what you say. You look at your life and you think, What do I believe? Am I loved? What is love? Am I happy? What is happiness? Am I successful? What is success? Then you listen for your answers. You stop and consider them. And you either like your answers to the questions or you dont. So you ask yourself, Is my life turning out the way I had hoped? This is your big question. See, you are on a path in life. You are headed in a direction based on the choices you have made and who you have become. You have certain commitments. And today and tomorrow you will invest more time, more energy and more money in this life that you have created. Now, if your life is not the one you desire . . . if you feel limited . . . if you feel trapped . . . if you are unhappy . . . its time for a rebirth. Its time to become the person you know you want to be. Its time to live your best possible life now. Like a baby, your life is full of possibility. Its time to Get Naked Again! To Get Naked Again! is to return to your core to find that place inside of you where all things are possible and you are not afraid. You connect to the good inside of you, and you believe deeply in your potential. You focus on enjoying every day, doing what you love and making a difference in your life. You commit to being happy; you begin living your best possible life now. You are ready to be brave. You are ready to pursue your dreams. So, you are ready to say: I have returned to my core, Where all things are possible, And I am not afraid. I am committed to being happy, And to living my best possible life now. I am Naked Again! Re-start the clock on your life. Get Naked Again!
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10/29/2010 1:27 PM
The Goal of the Hallway It happened many years ago. But I will never forget it. The church was full. Family members packed the front pews. Friends filled in behind them. Religious leaders, business leaders and community leaders were all there. There was a journalist quietly taking notes in the corner. Everyone was there to honor his life. One family member after another stepped to the pulpit to share their memories of him. Leaders followed with their tributes to him; they talked long about the impact he had on the community. He was an impressive man. The service was over. I lingered. Beautiful music was playing. I thought about the impact he had had on so many people. I then quietly walked out of the sanctuary. On the way to the reception in another part of the church, I saw a group of family members standing in the corner of a long hallway. They were looking down. They were talking quietly. No one was around them. I walked towards them. I thought I would say that Im sorry for their loss. I would tell them how amazing I thought he was. I would tell them how much he did for the community. I would try to comfort them. They looked up as I approached. They each smiled faintly. I stopped and I spoke. I told them everything I had planned to tell them. And then the one standing nearest to me spoke first. He said, Thank you for what you said. He then looked to the side. He paused. He looked back at me. Then he said, Many of the stories told today we had never heard. We did not know that about him. We did not always see that side of him. I froze. I did not say anything. No one said anything. He then broke the silence: The public knew a different man. He could have been around more . . . more for us. I then couldnt help myself. I stammered, I know he loved his family. Im sure he expressed it in different ways. They all then said that they loved him. They were proud of everything he did for the community. They just wished he had shared more of his love with his family. I did not expect to hear this about him. He had achieved such great things and he was a good man there remains no doubt of that yet, he left his family wishing that he had given more to them. We then said goodbye and I walked slowly down the long hallway to continue our tribute to him at the reception. For years I have read in books and articles and have heard in speeches and in seminars that we should write our own eulogy. We should write all the things that we would want people to say about us at our memorial service. The idea is that we would then live our life to match the tribute we wrote. While I have followed this advice previously in my life, I now have another goal. I now pursue what I call, The Goal of the Hallway. While I am grateful for what you might say of me in public, I care what you say in the hallway. The mark of my life will be what is said in the hallway, not just in the sanctuary. Memories of my life will be celebrated in private, not just on screens. My life stories will be told by others unrehearsed, not just in speeches. So I will try to focus on what matters most in my life. If you are my family, I will tell you that I love you. I will hug and kiss you. If you are my friend, I will care for you. I will be there for you. If you are my colleague, I will support you. I will appreciate you. And if you are in my community, I will work with you. I will reach out to you. I will try to focus on what matters most in my life. While I am grateful for what you might say of me in public, the mark of my life will be what you say in the hallway. This is The Goal of the Hallway. Consider making it yours.
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10/29/2010 1:28 PM
Who Do You Run To? It was 1976. I was in the fifth grade. The 50-yard dash record for Lake Bluff Elementary School in Shorewood, Wisconsin was set in the mid-1950s, and I had a chance to break it. I walked past my classmates and stepped up to the starting line. I looked at my gym teacher, Mr. Buddy Wolf. He blew his whistle and I took off running, pumping my legs and arms as fast as I could. Six-point-five seconds later I leaned into the finish line and heard the click of Mr. Wolfs stop watch. I turned around just as fast as I could to hear Mr. Wolf say: You just broke the school record! My class burst into applause. I jogged back to everyone. My buddies slapped me on the back and punched me in the arm. I was in fifth-grade Heaven! And then my thoughts turned to lunchtime. I wanted to get home to tell Mom, and call Dad at work. One period later, the lunch bell rang. I sprinted out of the classroom, down the stairs, out the side door and six blocks to my home. I opened the back door of the house, turned into the kitchen and saw Mom plating up a grilled cheese sandwich and a bowl of tomato soup. I kissed her, and then I told her all about the race, the record and my classmates cheering. She asked me to tell the whole story from start to finish, with every detail included. So I acted out what happened. She clapped. We laughed. She hugged me. And then I called Dad and relived the whole experience. He was thrilled for me, and it was one of the best days of my life. Now, who do you run to in your life? Who helps you celebrate your achievements? And why do you run to these special people? Why are they the first on your list? What about these individuals attracts you to them? UCLA psychology researcher Shelly Gable, University of Rochester psychology researcher Harry Reis and their colleagues discovered that there are four principal ways people respond to the good news of others, and only one of them makes a positive difference in a relationship. Active and Constructively: Theyre enthusiastic, theyre almost more happy and excited than I am, and they ask lots of questions. Passive and Constructively: They try not to make a big deal out of it, but are happy for me, or they say little, but I know they are happy for me. Active and Destructively: They often find a problem with it, or they point out the potential downsides of the good event. Passive and Destructively: They seem disinterested, they dont care much, or they dont pay much attention to me. Gables and Reiss research, published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, uncovered that only people who respond actively and constructively to your good news have a measurably positive impact on your enthusiasm, joy and happiness for life. They further discovered that people who receive active and constructive feedback in close personal relationships report higher relationship well-being as indicated by measures of intimacy and marital satisfaction. So, think about the people you love and care about. Do your children run to you with good news? Does your spouse? Do your friends? Do your employees? Think of the opportunities that you have to help bring out the best in the people you care about. Think about the joy you can amplify in their lives when you respond actively and constructively to their good news. And like my Mom and Dad did for me, think about the lasting memories you are helping create for the people you love. Be there for the people you care about. Let your loved ones run to you.
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10/29/2010 1:28 PM
Dont Waste Your Money! Find Out What Motivates People The first time it happened, I was totally surprised. I followed the same ritual as I had in the past. I called out to my three- and four-year-old girls, Papi has a present for you! And they squealed as usual, Yayyyyyyy! And then they ran to the couch, closed their eyes and opened their hands. And I said, Are you ready? Keep your eyes closed. Here it is! And this is what happened. Eliana and Arielas faces went blank and they said, Thats not a present. I said, What? Thats not very nice. I just gave you a gift! And they said, But, thats not what we wanted. If you are a leader, does this happen to you in your organization? The answer is probably, Yes, every day. Leaders and managers are constantly trying to motivate employees with incentives, awards and public recognition. And they have little idea if the money and time invested is really making a difference. Why? Because their employees are older than my little daughters, they learned a lesson years ago that I continue to teach my girls: Be polite. Adults have learned not to complain about someones gift when its presented to them. Leaders and managers rarely get direct feedback when their incentives, awards or recognition efforts are off the mark. So what do adults do? They complain to other people about your gifts. They tell everyone else how unfair your program is. They tell their family and friends that you dont really appreciate them. Or they simply forget about or ignore your effort. Your overtures do not influence them. How does this happen? Because shortcuts are taken. Leaders and managers implement programs without really knowing what motivates their employees. They do not do their homework. They assume that people only want money, public recognition or a new title. And theyre often wrong. People want different things. Ones motivation to achieve is not influenced by the same factors. We have to learn what our employees value in life. Do they want to learn more? Do they want a bigger challenge? Do they want a promotion? Do they want more time off? Do they only focus on money? Do they like to be left alone? Do they like you to constantly pat them on the back? Do they like public recognition? Do they prefer that you quietly acknowledge their work? The Gallup Organization has found in its research that employees who reported that they had received recognition every seven days were more engaged than the employees who did not receive recognition. The challenge is that the measurement of recognition is based on what your employees feel that they have received from you, not on what you think you have given to them. Your efforts to recognize and award your employees only count if they say they do. Your opportunity then is to ask your employees what matters to them. Ask them what they care about. Find out what they value in life. After you set and communicate the outcomes they must achieve in their roles, find out what inspires them to do their best, and what forms of recognition are meaningful to them. Here are three questions you can ask your employees that will help give you the insight you need. When you do a good job, how do you like to be acknowledged? When you do something special, how do you like to be recognized? Tell me about a time when you were recognized in a way that meant a lot to you. What about it was meaningful? Before you invest your time and money in a whole new incentive, award or recognition program in your organization, make sure that you know what motivates each of your employees. You dont want them to come to you one day and say, Thats not a present.
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10/29/2010 1:30 PM
Take the No Garbage Trucks Pledge Theres a revolution going on and youre now a part of it. And people from more than 100 countries have already joined you. You have read The Law of the Garbage Truck: You no longer let Garbage Trucks take over your life. I discovered The Law of the Garbage Truck more than 16 years ago in the back of a New York City taxi cab. And Ive shared it with thousands of people all over the world in my workshops and speeches. Ive written about the Law of the Garbage Truck in newspaper columns and on news sites worldwide. Ive talked about it on radio and television. And Ive shared it in the best-selling DVD, The Happiness Answer. And someone probably sent it to you in a mass email. People from around the world have been signing on to the No Garbage Trucks! Revolution. And now, so are you. If you want to be happy . . . If you want to be successful . . . You have to follow The Law of the Garbage Truck. Here is an excerpt from The Law of the Garbage Truck. Many people are like Garbage Trucks. They run around full of garbage, full of frustration, full of anger and full of disappointment. As their garbage piles up, they do what garbage trucks do: They look for a place to dump it. And if you let them, theyll dump it on you. So when someone wants to dump on you, dont take it personally. Just smile, wave, wish them well and move on. Believe me. Youll be happier. So join millions of others in the No Garbage Trucks Revolution. Take the No Garbage Trucks Pledge now. Just think: What would happen in your life, starting today, if you let more Garbage Trucks pass you by? Make a difference in the world. Take the Pledge. The No Garbage Trucks Pledge: I am not a Garbage Truck. I do not accept garbage in my life. When I see Garbage Trucks, I do not take them personally. I just smile. I wave. I wish them well. And I move on. And I do not spread garbage to others. I am not a Garbage Truck! I do not accept garbage in my life. Welcome and congratulations! You are now a member of the No Garbage Trucks Revolution. When you stop accepting garbage in your life, you become happier and more successful. And when you stop spreading garbage to others, you make the world a more beautiful place. Always remember your No Garbage Trucks Pledge. You do not accept garbage in your life. And you do not spread garbage to others. You are not a Garbage Truck. Now, spread the word. Tell the people you care about. Share the No Garbage Trucks Pledge with them. Together we can make the world a better place. We are not Garbage Trucks!
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10/29/2010 1:31 PM
Things Could Be Worse. Hows Your Perspective? I was in the kitchen with Mom. I was 13 years old. And I was going to give the first speech of my life the next morning. The speech would be in front of my teacher and my eighth grade class. I was nervous. I was afraid my speech would be terrible. I was worried that no one would like it. I was having trouble remembering my lines. I was pacing back and forth in the kitchen. And then my stomach started to itch. I started scratching. And then my chest itched. I kept scratching. And then my neck started to burn. I ran to the mirror over the sink to see what was happening. I ripped off my shirt, and saw red blotches all over my skin. And then I felt even worse. I thought, What if I still have these blotches when I go to school tomorrow? I looked at my mom and said, Can this get any worse? We just looked at each other. I broke the silence: Well, at least my face isnt red. Mom said: That would be worse. And I could have amnesia tomorrow, I said. That would be worse. We started laughing as we began listing all of the ways that things could be worse. We kept laughing and thinking of more ridiculous things until we could barely breathe. And when we finally caught our breath, we said something to each other that has stuck with me ever since: Things could be worse. Do you have problems that seem as if they will never go away? Do events in your life feel overwhelming? Do you believe that you have been dealt a bad hand in life? If you are acting as though your life is about as bad as it can get, one way to help you regain your perspective is to say: Things could be worse if . . . And then complete the sentence. Do this until you reach the point that you can see your problem, or your life, is not as bad as you thought. When you recognize that you have it better than you were thinking, you have succeeded: You have perspective. None of us wants bad things to happen to us. Yet sometimes we live our lives as if all the worst things have already fallen upon us. But when we see that we have a lot in our lives that we would not want to lose no matter how difficult things might be in the moment we recognize that we are fortunate. We have perspective. Psychologist Pamela Hartman wrote a chapter about perspective in Christopher Peterson and Martin Seligmans book, Character Strengths and Virtues. In her research, Hartman found that the development of perspective is a function not of the passage of time but of life experiences and how people respond to them. She further noted that researchers have found that individuals with greater wisdom age more successfully as measured by psychological and physical well-being, satisfaction in multiple life domains, psychosocial development and psychological resources. Perspective helps bring out our best in life. When Mom and I stopped laughing in the kitchen that night, I smiled broadly. I realized that I was no longer itching. I ran back to the mirror and saw that the blotches on my skin had almost faded away. The next day my classmates and I gave our speeches. And after all of us had spoken, our teacher asked us to select the two best speakers. We voted. I was chosen. I was excited. And I learned the importance of perspective.
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10/29/2010 1:32 PM
Dont Hold Yourself Back, Because No One Cares About You (And Thats Good!) I looked out my hotel window and saw at least seven buildings with 40 floors or more. It was 6 a.m., and I wondered how many people would work in those buildings that day. After I showered and dressed, I walked through Times Square. I looked around at all the people and thought, where is everyone going? When I arrived at Grand Central, there were thousands of people in the station: They were getting off trains, boarding trains and waiting for trains. I wondered what they did for a living, and what their ambitions were. I bought a muffin and a cup of coffee in the station, and I sat down on a bench. I watched everyone. And then it hit me: All the people I passed that day and there were thousands did not care about me, and they would not care about you either. Now, let me clarify what I mean. I believe that countless people would help us if we were in need. I also believe that many people care about us spiritually. They feel connected to us even though they have never met us. And I believe that people would be interested in us if we did something extraordinary, or we broke the law. On many important levels, people are interested in us and what we do. But in practical terms, most people do not care about us. Why? They do not know us, or they do not know us well. They are not invested in our lives. They do not care what we do for a living, what our dreams are, what we study, what we practice and what we do every day. When we are honest with ourselves, there are not many people in the world who focus their attention on us every day. People simply have to attend to their own lives to make them work. They do not have the luxury of worrying about someone they do not know very well, or at all. But then why do most of us worry about what other people think? Most of us go about our lives worried about what everyone else thinks about our dreams, careers, finances, relationships and work. We worry about failing in front of others. We worry about not being good enough, or doing enough. We worry about looking bad. But would we worry if we were guaranteed that our potential failures would be kept private? The reality is that we practically have that privacy guarantee already: Most of our successes and failures are unknown to the world. Only celebrities movie, music, sports and political stars have their lives examined on a daily basis for everyone to see. The rest of us live in near anonymity. And this is good news. It means we have freedom. We have the flexibility to choose the path in life that is best for us. We can experiment. We can explore. We can live our best possible life. And heres something else important to note. When people do become aware of our successes, they are mostly concerned with our results, not our journeys. Some of us have to study harder, work longer hours and make more mistakes along the way than the average person. But all of that is forgotten when we succeed. The cameras flash when we are on the victory stand, not when we are on the practice field. So the next time you want to make an important change in your life and you are afraid of what others might think, look outside your imaginary hotel window in New York City, walk through Times Square, stop in Grand Central Station and remind yourself that your success or failure is your concern, and not the focus of the world. Know that you are free. Live your best possible life now. Dont hold yourself back because of what other people might think.
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10/29/2010 1:32 PM
Spread Love, Not Garbage Another column in The Law of the Garbage Truck series I recently took my little girls, five-year-old Eliana and four-year-old Ariela, into Blockbuster Video to rent the movie Ratatouille. We found the movie on the shelf and took it to the counter to pay. And then we waited. And we waited. My girls and I waited as the sales clerk handled a customer service issue on the telephone. The sales clerk signaled with her eyes that she knew that we were there. Her message was that she would help us as soon as possible. And so we waited. I could tell that the customer on the telephone was being difficult and would not let the sales clerk off the phone. This was putting even more pressure on her because she was the only one working in the store and customers were lining up behind us. So I turned away from the counter and started talking to my girls about the popcorn we would make when we got home. Just then the sales clerk hung up the telephone and invited me to step forward. I apologize for the wait, she said. I said, It sounds like you had a tough customer on the line. She said, Yeah, but thats OK. Its all right. I knew she was frustrated, but she was doing her best not to let it show. I handed her my money for the rental. She put the movie in a bag and handed it to me. I said thanks, and my girls and I walked to the exit. And before we reached the door, my little girls started to debate who would get to carry the bag. I stopped. I knew the drill. I had to break the impasse. When I was just about to tell them how we would decide who would have the honor of carrying the bag this time, the sales clerk came out from behind the counter, and walked over to us. She was carrying another bag in her hand with a catalogue tucked inside. The sales clerk leaned down, smiled at my girls, and said, I have another bag for you girls. One of you can carry the new bag and one of you can carry the bag with the movie. You both get to carry a bag. Hows that? My girls looked at each other, smiled, and said, Ohhh. Thank you. The sales clerk gave me a big smile, and said, I have two girls. I know about these things. She proudly walked back to her next customer. And I walked my girls to the car feeling grateful. Our sales clerk had a choice to make. She could either have fed the Cycle of Garbage in the world or she could have fed the Cycle of Love. Our sales clerk chose to stop the garbage and feed the love. She followed The Law of the Garbage Truck. She let a difficult experience with a customer pass her by, and did not hold onto it. She focused on what she could control. With that decision, our sales clerk made the world a more beautiful place. Good people like my sales clerk are all around us. Lets find them together. Lets acknowledge them and recognize them. The next time you witness people stopping the Cycle of Garbage and feeding the Cycle of Love, let them know how much you appreciate them. And then send me an e-mail and tell me their stories. I will write about them in a future column or in my blog. Spread love, not garbage. Youll be happier, and so will the world around you.
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10/29/2010 1:33 PM
Momentum Makes Life Better Life is good. We should be grateful for our lives every day. We should find joy in our lives. Believe this. Remember this. And momentum makes life better. Momentum is powerful. Momentum requires more than just being good. Your momentum depends on your ability to maintain what is good in your life and then build upon it. The core of momentum is an appreciation of what you have, and a commitment to your continued growth. Success and happiness depend on momentum. Success and happiness begin with an understanding of what is right in your life, a desire to care for it and a belief that you can do better. Momentum does not allow for procrastination, backsliding and giving up. Momentum is all about action. Momentum requires you to use your resources to achieve more of what you value and enjoy. You must strive to learn more, love more, care more, try more and experience more. Your happiness and success rely on your positive momentum. Nineteenth Century Swiss writer Gottfried Keller said it best: "We don't remain good if we don't always strive to become better." Do you understand momentum? Answer these questions to find out. Think about a game or contest you participated in sports, school or business during your life. Was it easier to score points when you were on a roll, or when you were just doing OK? Think back to when you were single (or if youre single now, pay attention). When were you most attractive to others? Was it when you were dating regularly, or when you were not dating anyone? If you have ever been in sales, is it easier to make a sale after you have established relationships with potential customers, or when you are just meeting them for the first time? If youre a parent, is it easier to get your children to talk about something thats bothering them, or to keep them talking once they open up? If youre a student, is it easier to start writing a paper, or to keep writing once you are in flow? If you have ever tried to lose weight, was it easier to start the diet, or to stick to it once you started losing weight?
You know the answers: You do better when youre already in action. Getting started is always the hardest part. Momentum makes life better. If youre competing, dating, selling, parenting, studying or dieting, you want momentum. You dont wait for success to happen. And you dont sit on success once you have it. You maintain your success and you build upon it. And when you have momentum you want people to know that youre on a mission. You want them on your team. You want their help. You want their support. And when you have momentum, people are more likely to help you. And better yet, they want you on their team. Momentum feels good. Remember how momentum feels. You feel powerful. You feel great. You feel confident. You feel unstoppable. And the beauty of momentum is that it is contagious. When you achieve momentum in one area of your life, it is easier to achieve it in other areas of your life. And when you experience momentum, the people around you benefit: You give yourself, and everyone in your life, the best you have. Einstein said, Objects at rest have no momentum. So, think about everything that is important to you. And ask yourself, Am I moving? Remember life is good. And momentum makes life better. Get moving, and enjoy your best possible life.
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10/29/2010 1:35 PM
We Can Be Happy; History Says Its Up to Us Since the beginning of time, man has been concerned with how to achieve happiness. Philosophers, theologians and, later, psychologists have all tried to provide the answers. In the Fourth Century B.C., the Greek philosopher Aristippus told us that the key to happiness was to maximize pleasure and minimize pain. He called his approach to happiness Hedonism, the Greek word for pleasure. Decades later, Epicurus went even further and said it was mans moral obligation to maximize his experience of pleasure. Socrates took a different tact. He believed happiness is achieved through the pursuit of virtue and knowledge (aret and epistem in Greek). Continuing in this vein, Aristotle wrote that man can only be happy when he identifies his virtues, cultivates them and lives in accordance with them. The idea is that we should develop what is best within us, and then apply our talents and skills to the betterment of others and our world. Socrates and Aristotles approach to happiness is known as Eudaimonia, loosely translated from Greek to mean happiness. On the other side of the world, Confucius taught us that all men have the power to transform their lives: A good life is possible for everyone, not just the privileged in society. And then like Aristotle, Mencius believed that true joy in our lives is possible when we nurture our sprouts of virtue. Zhangzi then shifted the focus to the importance of intuition, and away from the mind. He taught the power of the Dao, and how happiness comes from living in harmony with nature. Buddha then introduced the way of the eightfold path. Buddha taught that the key to a good life was found in controlling your mind that peace and happiness could be attained through a meditative life. Many more have spoken and written about happiness through the centuries. Marcus Aurelius said, Remember this, that very little is needed to make a happy life. The renaissance philosophers Erasmus and Thomas Moore believed that it was Gods desire that man be happy, as long as the means taken to achieve happiness were not superficial. Benjamin Franklin wrote, Happiness depends more on the inward disposition of the mind than on the outward circumstances. German philosopher Immanuel Kant said, Morality is not properly the doctrine of how we may make ourselves happy, but how we may make ourselves worthy of happiness. William James, the father of modern-day psychology believed, How to gain, how to keep, how to recover happiness is in fact for most men at all times the secret motive of all they do, and of all they are willing to endure. Psychologist Abraham Maslow wrote that we must satisfy our hierarchy of human needs before true happiness self-actualization is achieved. And psychologist Viktor Frankl emphasized mans search for meaning: Our happiness is reliant on our ability to live a life full of meaning and purpose. Throughout recorded history it is clear that man has contemplated and pursued happiness. And the great philosophers, theologians and psychologists have helped us realize that happiness is achievable for all of us. Whenever I needed to meet a challenge or pursue a goal when I was growing up, my grandfather used to tell me to say, I can. I will. His guidance is relevant to all of us. We can be happy. We will be happy. History says its up to us.
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10/29/2010 1:35 PM
We Can Be Happy; History Says Its Up to Us Since the beginning of time, man has been concerned with how to achieve happiness. Philosophers, theologians and, later, psychologists have all tried to provide the answers. In the Fourth Century B.C., the Greek philosopher Aristippus told us that the key to happiness was to maximize pleasure and minimize pain. He called his approach to happiness Hedonism, the Greek word for pleasure. Decades later, Epicurus went even further and said it was mans moral obligation to maximize his experience of pleasure. Socrates took a different tact. He believed happiness is achieved through the pursuit of virtue and knowledge (aret and epistem in Greek). Continuing in this vein, Aristotle wrote that man can only be happy when he identifies his virtues, cultivates them and lives in accordance with them. The idea is that we should develop what is best within us, and then apply our talents and skills to the betterment of others and our world. Socrates and Aristotles approach to happiness is known as Eudaimonia, loosely translated from Greek to mean happiness. On the other side of the world, Confucius taught us that all men have the power to transform their lives: A good life is possible for everyone, not just the privileged in society. And then like Aristotle, Mencius believed that true joy in our lives is possible when we nurture our sprouts of virtue. Zhangzi then shifted the focus to the importance of intuition, and away from the mind. He taught the power of the Dao, and how happiness comes from living in harmony with nature. Buddha then introduced the way of the eightfold path. Buddha taught that the key to a good life was found in controlling your mind that peace and happiness could be attained through a meditative life. Many more have spoken and written about happiness through the centuries. Marcus Aurelius said, Remember this, that very little is needed to make a happy life. The renaissance philosophers Erasmus and Thomas Moore believed that it was Gods desire that man be happy, as long as the means taken to achieve happiness were not superficial. Benjamin Franklin wrote, Happiness depends more on the inward disposition of the mind than on the outward circumstances. German philosopher Immanuel Kant said, Morality is not properly the doctrine of how we may make ourselves happy, but how we may make ourselves worthy of happiness. William James, the father of modern-day psychology believed, How to gain, how to keep, how to recover happiness is in fact for most men at all times the secret motive of all they do, and of all they are willing to endure. Psychologist Abraham Maslow wrote that we must satisfy our hierarchy of human needs before true happiness self-actualization is achieved. And psychologist Viktor Frankl emphasized mans search for meaning: Our happiness is reliant on our ability to live a life full of meaning and purpose. Throughout recorded history it is clear that man has contemplated and pursued happiness. And the great philosophers, theologians and psychologists have helped us realize that happiness is achievable for all of us. Whenever I needed to meet a challenge or pursue a goal when I was growing up, my grandfather used to tell me to say, I can. I will. His guidance is relevant to all of us. We can be happy. We will be happy. History says its up to us.
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10/29/2010 1:36 PM
Your To Thank List The most common list people carry with them every day is a to do list. It tells them how they will spend their time and what they must accomplish. In some ways you could also view a to do list as a scorecard: Your success is determined by how many of the items you get through. Seventeen years ago I began to carry another list with me. Its called my to thank list. I learned that my successes were not possible without help from my family, friends and colleagues. And I also realized that I counted on their friendship and love during my most trying times. So I began to carry a to thank list. My to thank list includes two groups of people: The permanent members and the people who come in and out of my life. My family, friends and colleagues are on my permanent list: I thank them at the start of each day during my morning gratitude ritual. And I speak with them often. I cherish these people, and I would not want to live without them. I also have a guest member list to thank. These are the individuals who may not be a permanent part of my life, but they sure are helping me now. Each week I make sure to thank these people for the role they play in my life. My day is not complete until I have acknowledged my to thank list. I consider this one of my most important to dos every day: When I thank the people who make my good life possible, I accomplish something very important. Research conducted by Robert Emmons at the University of California at Davis demonstrates that we enjoy better relationships, better health and greater happiness when we increase our gratitude. And if youre in business, The Gallup organization has found in their research that when employees receive recognition every seven days, they are more engaged and more productive. What about your to thank list? Is it written down? Do you carry it with you? Can you recite it by memory? This week make it your project and create your to thank list. Start by writing down all your permanent members. Then add your guest members to your list. Who are you going to thank this week? And if you want your colleagues, friends and family to join you on your mission, send this column along to them. Have a great week, and let me know how it goes!
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10/29/2010 1:37 PM
Live Your Best Life First, Then Magnify It Money will not change you, but it will magnify who you already are. If you know what you want in the future, find a way to bring as much of it into the present as possible. You must build the skill of living your best possible life now. You cannot just hope that youll know what to do when the money comes. What People Want In Life When I ask people to describe what they want most in their lives, they say things such as: I want to spend more time with my family. I dont see them enough. I want my work to be meaningful. I dont think what I do makes a difference. I want my career to be interesting and fun. Im tired of doing the same thing. I want more vacation time. Im stressed. I need to relax. I want to be in better touch with my friends. Ive lost contact with a lot of people. I want to eat better. My health is not as good as it should be. I want to exercise more. Im out of shape. I want to read more. I dont have time to learn new things. I want to give back to my community. I dont give enough.
And when I ask those same people how they are going to do all of this and more, they often answer, When I make more money. While money is the word that captures our attention, the real word to focus on is when. Most people describe the things that they want in life as future events. The good things will come later after they deal with the reality of today. Now if you believe that important changes in your life can only come to you in the future, it takes the pressure off of you today: You can just keep on doing what youre currently doing. You dont have to change anything. You can hold onto your beliefs, habits and plans (even if they are limiting you). Challenge Your Mindset This week lets challenge that mindset. Lets devise a different strategy. First, consider my three questions.
1. What do you want to achieve this week? (purpose) 2. What will you do this week? (commitment) 3. Who will you be this week? (integrity)
Second, focus your attention on your career and your family life over the next seven days. What could you change this week that would bring you closer to living your best possible life? What would you take out of your dreams and put into your life today? Choose one thing that will help you move your career in the direction you want it to go, and choose one thing that will improve your relationship with the people you love. Additional Motivation And if youre looking for a little more motivation to make your changes, ask yourself these two questions:
1. What will I do this week that will make me proud of

myself?
2. What will I do this week that my family will appreciate

and remember? Start Now You know what you want. You know who you want to be. You know what you have to do. So, start living your best possible life now. Why wait?
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10/29/2010 1:38 PM
Dont Let Garbage Trucks Cloud Your Judgment I recently ordered a cup of tea at Starbucks. After I paid, I walked over to the counter where the milk, sugar and napkins were kept. And as I made my way across the cafe, I saw a woman leaning against the counter waiting for someone. She saw me and stepped back so I could reach the milk. She said, Sorry about that. I smiled and said, Thats OK. Standing there is a great way to meet people. She said, Yeah . . . I should probably try that. It might help me find a job and an apartment. I looked up as I put the milk back. She continued: Its so hard to meet people around here. Really, I said. Why? People are so rude here! she said. I responded with curiosity, How long have you been here? We moved down here yesterday, she quickly said. I then told her that I had lived in the area for five years, and that the people around here are actually very nice. In fact, they are as friendly as in any other part of the world where I have worked, studied or visited. And then I smiled and told her to make sure that she puts me in her nice people column! She laughed! I told her my name was David. She said hers was Jane. I wished her well, and we said goodbye. I walked out of the cafe and I was struck by one thing that Jane said: People are so rude here! Jane jumped to a conclusion about more than a million people in less than 48 hours. So, consider these questions. When Jane decided people are so rude around here, how large was her sample of people? And what was her attitude when she interacted with these people? What was she saying? What was she doing? And will her judgment of the people she met help her to make friends and get a good job, or will it limit her ability to connect with people? In a paper published in The Journal of Career Assessment, Does Happiness Promote Career Success? Julia Boehm and Sonja Lyubomirsky, psychology researchers at the University of California at Riverside, wrote: . . . prior research suggests that positive emotions are associated with approach-oriented behavior. That is, people in a good mood are more likely to enter novel situations, interact with other people and pursue new goals. Positive emotions also signal that life is good and that no threats are readily apparent. Its possible that Jane had run into some difficult people in the very short time she had been here. But her problem is that she let these experiences with a few people shape her view of the world. The negative emotions she was feeling were limiting her ability to successfully connect with other people. You know better. You dont let Garbage Trucks cloud your judgment. You know The Law of the Garbage Truck. Here is an excerpt from my Law of the Garbage Truck. Many people are like garbage trucks. They run around full of garbage, full of frustration, full of anger, and full of disappointment. As their garbage piles up, they do what garbage trucks do: They look for a place to dump it. And if you let them, theyll dump it on you. So when someone wants to dump on you, dont take it personally. Just smile, wave, wish them well, and move on. Believe me. Youll be happier. So, when you encounter Garbage Trucks in your life, let them pass by. Dont take Garbage Trucks personally: Just smile, wave, wish them well and move on. When you do, you free yourself to focus on what is important to you. And this is the best time for you to meet people.
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10/29/2010 1:38 PM
A Gratitude Moment: The Letter I checked on Dawn and the girls. Dawn was sleeping. Eliana and Ariela were sprawled across our bed fast asleep. We let them stay up a little later than usual (sometimes we let them fall asleep on our bed, and then I carry them upstairs to their rooms). As I was heading from our bedroom to the kitchen, I stopped in the foyer to look at two pieces of mail that were opened and sitting on a shelf. I reached for the one on top. It was a letter. It was addressed to Dawn. I read the first two lines. Thank you for your recent visit to our facility. Your digital mammogram shows no evidence of cancer. I stopped. I didnt read the rest of the letter. I just thought about what it could have said. And then I thought about all the other letters that were opened today, and the letters that would be opened tomorrow. Many thousands of women would be blessed with good news. I also thought about all the women around the world who had received or will receive the news they fear most. Then I had what I call a gratitude moment. I headed to a window. I looked outside and took in the big world. And I said thank you. Thank you for blessing the health of my wife, children, parents and all of my family. Thank you for caring for my friends and colleagues. And I said thank you for everything that is good in my life. I know letters and phone calls could come at any time with news I would never want to hear. So, when I am reminded of the good in my life, I stop and say thank you. I want to always appreciate the abundance in my life. The science of positive psychology now points us to the psychological and physical benefits of feeling grateful. Robert Emmons of the University of California at Davis and Michael McCollough of the University of Miami found in their research, published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology: There do appear to exist benefits to regularly focusing on ones blessings. The advantages are most pronounced when compared with a focus on hassles or complaints . . . In one study Emmons and McCollough . . . found that a weekly benefit listing was associated with more positive and optimistic appraisals of ones life, more time spent exercising, and fewer reported physical symptoms. In another study they discovered: People led to focus on their blessings were also more likely to report having helped someone with a personal problem or offered emotional support to another . . . And in one more study the research pair found that people induced to feel gratitude experienced . . . greater levels of positive affect, more sleep, better sleep quality and greater optimism and a sense of connectedness to others. The evidence is in: Gratitude pays dividends to all who practice it. So, would you join me this week on a special journey? This week look for the reminders of the good in your life. And when you find them, stop and say thanks. You have much to celebrate in your life.
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10/29/2010 1:39 PM
Look for Beauty and Opportunity A few weeks ago, my younger daughter, four-year-old Ariela, and I went to a little caf for breakfast. After our meal, I held her hand as we went for a walk in an old residential neighborhood. And about five minutes into our walk, Ariela said, Papi, look at that tree. I looked up and saw a fairly common looking tree without many leaves. Not there Papi, Ariela said as she pointed. Look up there! I looked up even higher. And at the top of the tree was a burst of orange color. I had never seen anything like it before. It was absolutely beautiful. It looked like a giant bouquet of orange flowers perched on the trees canopy. With enthusiastic prodding from my daughter, I saw beauty I had not seen before. This Week At Home This week let my daughter prod you too: Look for beauty in your family and in your home. Rather than notice the things that frustrate and distract you, make it a point to be an explorer of beauty. What do you notice about your children that makes them special? Think about what you see, and tell them. What do you appreciate about your spouse that you have not thought about lately, or possibly have never acknowledged? Let them know, and make them feel great. What about your home is just right for you? Remind yourself of what is special about where you live. This Week At Work In each of your meetings, telephone conversations and hallway chats, look for one thing of beauty, novelty or curiosity. Be on the lookout for things you have not seen or considered before. Think of yourself as a student this week keep your mind open and nimble. Listen to new ideas. Ask for more input. Welcome feedback. Be the one to look for opportunity in your interactions. Be A Reporter Keep a notebook with you. Write notes. Carry a camera. Take pictures. Talk to your family and colleagues. Ask questions. Be on the lookout for beauty where you have not seen it before. And do what reporters do: Focus. Turn off the television, radio, cell phone and computer more often than you normally do this week. Drive without the radio on, and roll down your windows if possible. Wake up earlier at home. Go outside. Take another route to work. Invite someone interesting to lunch. Make a conscious effort to take a break from your routine: This is when you will notice things that you are typically moving too quickly to observe. Look for that burst of orange color in all areas of your life. Be the one to see color when others might only see black and white. Invite Your Family and Friends to Join You And if you want your family, colleagues and friends to join you on your journey, send this column along to them. Have a great week, and let me know how it goes!
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10/29/2010 1:39 PM
Employees and Plants: Each One Needs Something Different When I was in college my roommates and I decided that we needed plants to liven up our dorm suite. So we walked to the local grocery store and went shopping. We had two criteria: The plants needed to look healthy, and each one had to be of a different variety. We bought four plants and brought them home. We put them around the suite, and then we watered them. We decided that we would use the same size mug each time to give them their water; we wanted to get it right each time. Two days later we watered the plants again. We were proud that we remembered. But shortly afterwards three of the four plants looked a little droopy. So we grabbed the mug and watered them all again. Another day passed and the same three were drooping even farther, so we watered them again. And the next day, the three plants looked even worse. The fourth plant was doing fine; it looked as good as it did in the store. Now we werent botanists, but we knew that all the plants needed water. And the fourth plant was evidence of this. It was doing great. But somehow the others were not faring so well. And then we figured it out: We knew what the problem was. The other three plants needed even more water! So we gave each plant a double dose of water. And what happened to our plants? One of the plants was as healthy as ever. The other three plants looked in terrible shape when one of our friends visited and said, Youre giving them too much water. We all said defensively in a loud chorus, What! All plants need water. And she said, Yes, but in different amounts. One way to know is to touch the soil. If the soil is dry, the plant needs water. If the soil is wet, the plant has plenty of water. Heres the translation of this story to Corporate America. We were acting like a typical manager. We were treating our employees the same, no matter the result. We knew how to do one thing and we poured it on when it wasnt working. Most managers think and do the same thing. Managers forget that we all want people to understand us. We want people to know the real us. We work harder for managers who treat us as individuals and help us to be our best selves. A number of years ago I was in a meeting with senior leaders discussing the importance of recognizing employees when they do good work. And this is what one leader said, I rarely give out recognition; I believe my employees work harder when I keep my positive feedback in short supply. Was his strategy effective? Yes, but with only one person. The rest of his team had individual preferences for when and how they liked to be recognized. He wasnt reaching the rest of his team. But he had a deep-set belief that everyone should get the same pint-sized ration of feedback. He eventually left the company. You will do best when you take the time to know what brings out the strengths of your employees. How do you know what they need? The answer is simple. Touch them through your questions, your interest and your support. Theyll tell you what they need. So go ahead and put your same size mug of water away. Give employees what they need to succeed. Speak their language and watch them grow.
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10/29/2010 1:40 PM
Be TANK-full, and Do Happy Bring out your best in life. Take my TANK quiz now. Make a mental note of how you feel when you hear the following: (1) Your best friend achieved something great; (2) Someone in another department of your organization was promoted; (3) Someone you know became famous; (4) Someone you met at a party said, I love what I do! If your answers are anything but, Im happy for all of them, you have just been given an important clue that you may not be living your best possible life. Heres another outward sign that your life is not as satisfying as it could be. Notice the way in which you respond to a friend who says, I have great news that I want to share with you. You friend proceeds to tell you all about it and then you give an answer like, Good for you. And thats all you say. Or you launch into something about yourself. Or maybe you start complaining about how things are for you and others. Heres the challenge. If you are responding in any of those ways, you are not living your best life. Your response to the success of others is a mirror reflecting whats not right in your life. Rather than immediately saying, Wow, thats great news. Im happy for you. You instead focus inward on what youre not happy about. If youre personally dissatisfied with your life, you have less to give to others. TANK-full people, on the other hand, have plenty to give. They do four things consistently. They thank people when they deserve it. They ask others how they are doing. They notice peoples accomplishments. And they are consistently kind. TANK-full people are a reliable source of support, inspiration and love. We cherish their presence in our lives, and most of us aspire to be like them. These special people have a lot to share because they feel that they already have so much. You often measure your happiness by what you feel. When you focus on increasing your ability to thank people, ask others how they are doing, notice other peoples accomplishments, and show kindness to others, your happiness can be measured by what you do. The field of positive psychology guides you to think about your life as an opportunity to do three things: Use your most natural strengths, engage in activities that hold great meaning for you and savor and enjoy your daily life as you live it. When you increase your ability to do these things every day, research demonstrates that you increase your happiness. Gottfried Keller said, We dont remain good if we dont always strive to become better. When you commit every day to live your best possible life, you have more to give: Youre ready to nourish others with your support. So, the next time you hear about someones good news you will be able to say, Wow, thats great! You should be excited! Why? Your TANK is full.
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10/29/2010 1:40 PM
Your Strengths Are Your Best Material The other day one of you wrote to me, David, why should we focus on our strengths? We can do some more work on what were already good at, but why not just get right to our weaknesses? Let me tell you about an experience I had with one of my daughters. Last year, Eliana, who was four at the time, came into the kitchen with a big smile and a rattling box in her hands. She walked past me, climbed up on a stool and dropped the box on the breakfast counter. I had barely enough time to read the box cover, Jewelry Making Kit, when Eliana said, Papi, lets make a bracelet. Eliana and I delicately strung beads on a bracelet wire. We used beads of all colors, beads with numbers, and we even spelled Elianas name. One hour later and our bracelet was complete. There was just one problem. The bracelet did not fit Elianas wrist! I couldnt believe it. After all that effort, it was too small. I wouldnt accept it. I had invested too much time to give up, and I didnt want to disappoint Eliana. So I tried everything to make it work. I took off beads. I made the knots on the ends smaller. I tried to stretch the wire. And then finally, somehow I found a way to hook the bracelet, but just barely. I was relieved until I heard a yell from the play room five minutes later. I ran in to find Eliana, and Ariela, my then-three year old, looking at the floor. Not only had the bracelet popped off, all the beads were now buried in our carpet! The bottom line was simple: The bracelet just didnt fit. It didnt matter what we did, there was not enough material to work with. We did not have enough bracelet wire. The same is true when we try to do great things in our lives by spending our energy focusing on our weaknesses: We get coached, we get trained, we get motivated, we get inspired, but theres only so much we can do. Why? Theres just not enough material to work with thats why theyre weaknesses. The science of Positive Psychology focuses instead on how we can use our most natural strengths to achieve our greatest and most gratifying successes in life. Most people focus their life on simply building skills to meet their job responsibilities. The best leaders know that this approach is incomplete. They focus instead on bringing out their top strengths, developing them and maximizing their use in support of the outcomes they are determined to achieve. Then these leaders turn to skill building to complement their natural power. They start with strength, and then add skill. Your chances of success as a leader increase greatly when you follow my ADAPT Strengths Model of Leadership Development. Leaders do best when they become aware of their strengths, develop them, apply them to their work and life, partner with others to amplify their strengths and find ways to work around their lesser strengths. They then implement this same approach with the teams they lead. The most important thing you can do in your life is to use your most abundant strengths and passion to live your best life possible. Dont make bracelets that wont fit. The best place to look for greatness is inside our strengths. Go where you have the best material.
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10/29/2010 1:41 PM
Momentum Can Be Scary Heres a question I get asked a lot: Why is it so hard to maintain positive momentum in our lives? Others have asked me: How can we create and keep momentum in our careers? Positive momentum is the key to success in business and to happiness in life. Most of us say that we want momentum we want to be on a roll in life. The problem is that many of us struggle with momentum once we experience it. I remember skiing for the first time. I was 17 years old. I was in Wisconsin at one of the states two hills. I had just finished my first ski lesson with a group of first graders. I thought, If they can do it, I can do it. I was ready to take on the hill. I jumped on the chair lift and rode to the top. I hopped off the ride and looked down. My goal was to ski the hill without falling. And off I went. Ten feet, 20 feet, 40 feet, 80 feet, and I was still on my skis! One hundred feet, 200 feet, 400 feet, and I was still standing! Seconds later I was one quarter of the way down the mountain and I was still going! And then all of a sudden I started to worry. I started thinking, What if I hit someone, what if I veer off the path, what if I go too fast, what if I cant stop, what if, what if . . .? And before I knew it I had decided Id had enough. Unfortunately, I forgot how to stop, so I dove into the snow like a B-Movie stuntman. I landed face first and my skis went flying. Even though my face was freezing, my knees were hurting, my skis were sliding down the hill and the first graders were sailing past me, I was relieved. I no longer had to worry about what could have happened as a result of all my momentum I had stopped it all together. Most of us have experienced something like this in our lives. Momentum can be scary. It not only moves us more quickly to our goals, it often carries us past our goals. It launches us into a new world of possibilities, many of which are unfamiliar to us. We are initially excited about the abundance that comes with momentum, but then we begin to fear our increasing level of performance. We are afraid that it could lead us to something for which we may not be prepared, or that we are not expecting or that we may not like when we get there. The good news is that achieving and experiencing momentum in our lives does not have to be scary. The power of positive momentum can help us achieve our goals more efficiently, with less effort and without negative stress. We will be challenged, but not anxious. We will have people and processes set up to help us stay on a roll. When we have the right support and focus, positive momentum will lead us to realize our dreams.
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10/29/2010 1:42 PM
How to Find More Time in Your Life Take The Morning Test Dawn and the girls were in bed. I was tired from a long day at work. It was almost 10 p.m. and I was headed for the couch. I needed to watch TV. I had to relax before bedtime. I deserved it. And then the next morning, I woke up tired. I was so tired that I was already thinking about going to bed that night. It was obvious that I needed more sleep. Yet every night I needed to relax on the couch. I lived this stay-up-late, wake-up-tired cycle for too long. I never fully admitted the obvious connection between my choices at night and how I felt in the morning. That is until I took what I call The Morning Test. Heres how The Morning Test works. Every night for one week write down everything that you do at night. Jot down what you eat for snacks, the TV shows you watch, the radio programs you listen to, the email you read, the sites you surf and whatever else you do. Then immediately after waking up the next morning and this is important think about what you did the night before. Think about everything you did that still makes you happy, and what you think was a waste of time. Write it all down. Do this for one week and see which activities are meaningful to you, and which ones you do by force of habit. Heres your opportunity: Replace some of your less helpful habits with activities that are gratifying to you. Why is this important? Because were always wishing we had more time to do more of what we care about. This exercise helps us to make sure that what we do at night serves us well the next day, and helps us make progress toward achieving the important goals in our life. Most of us are afraid of changing our habits, especially those at nighttime. We feel powerful emotions that we deserve to watch TV, or that weve earned the right to just veg out. We think well feel cheated the next day if we dont indulge ourselves. I asked Positive Psychology researcher Ed Diener from the University of Illinois about the staying power of emotions overnight. Diener told me that his research shows that 95 percent of our emotions experienced before bedtime dissipate by the morning. When we take The Morning Test, we realize that the emotional charge we feel to do something at night is mostly gone when we wake up. Its as though most of our emotions are reset each morning. The Morning Test helps jump start change in our lives. Psychology researcher James Prochaska discovered that there are six distinct processes that people must go through in order to lastingly change a behavior. The first two stages relate to becoming aware of the need to change, the third addresses the preparation needed for change, the fourth is making the change itself, and the last two involve change maintenance. The Morning Test helps you move through these stages. You become aware of the change you need to make. You set a plan to change. You make the change. You reinforce the change by taking The Morning Test each day. And as a result, you are reminded of your progress, thereby increasing the likelihood that you will stick to your plan. So if youre headed for the couch tonight with a remote control in one hand and a dessert in the other, take The Morning Test when you wake up tomorrow. It could lead to an important and lasting change in your life.
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10/29/2010 1:42 PM
Find Your Voice By Tapping Your Strengths
It was 1977 and I was in the sixth grade. I joined the Boys Choir. I really didnt like singing in choirs, but I joined anyway. All my friends had signed up, so I did too. I can still remember our two performances. I stood in the back row of the choir and mumbled my way through most of the songs. Why? I didnt know all the words. So I sang the choruses and smiled a lot. How many of us mumble and stumble through life? We just go through the motions. Were not happy with our performance, but we continue anyway. Will we ever be good at what were doing? More importantly, will we ever be happy if we stick with the things about which were not passionate? Martin Seligman, Ph.D., of the University of Pennsylvania, and Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Ph.D., of Claremont College the co-founders of positive psychology wrote that people do their best when they focus on identifying and nurturing their strongest qualities, what they own and are best at, and . . . find niches in which they can best live out these strengths. Success will come to us when we discover what we enjoy doing, what natural strengths we have and what activities we find meaningful. Positive psychology researcher Christopher Peterson, Ph.D., of the University of Michigan, and Dr. Seligman conducted extensive research on strengths. They developed a scientifically validated and widely used assessment tool to help people discover and learn about their strengths. The assessment is called the Values in Action Inventory of Strengths Survey (VIA-IS). The VIA-IS helps people identify what strengths are most natural to them the strengths they use most often in their lives. Nearly one million people throughout the world have taken the assessment. You can complete the VIA-IS Survey at www.viastrengths.com. When you complete the VIA-IS, you will walk away with a greater awareness of your top five strengths. You should then ask yourself two powerful questions. First, how do you use your top five strengths in some way every day, and how have you used them in the past? Youll find out that you express your strengths in many areas of your life. Second, when you look back at your most significant accomplishments in your life, which of your top strengths helped you achieve those successes? Youll begin to see a pattern in your life: You will discover that many of your greatest achievements were made possible by engaging your top strengths. Now that weve talked about your strengths, what about your weaknesses? Can you forget them? The answer is no, but. The but is that you no longer should focus your energies on trying to fix your weaknesses. Theres a better answer: Look for the people who have the strengths you lack and partner with them. Focus on what you do best, and then let others do the same. So, let other people sing in the Boys Choir if thats what they love to do. As for you, find your own voice in life and express it in your own unique way.
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10/29/2010 1:43 PM
Ask for Help and Keep Going to Achieve Your Dreams Last year I returned to Yale for my 20th college reunion. And like what happens to most people who attend reunions, I thought about my life then, and now. See, I am grateful for my life. I love my wife. I adore my girls. I cherish my parents. I have great friends. My health is good. I enjoy where I live. I love what I do for a living. My life is not perfect, but it is good. So as I stood on the Yale campus with my family, I thought about the lesson I had learned when I was a first-semester freshman: When things dont go your way, ask for help and keep going. A very disappointing week I learned that lesson after one of the most disappointing weeks of my life. I was a young kid from Wisconsin away from home for the first time and I was trying to make it through my first semester at Yale. I wanted to pack my bags and head home. I remember the beginning of that week: I was sitting in the front row of a large auditorium with about 400 students sitting on the main floor, and another 100 sitting in the balcony. As I got up to hand in my economics mid-term exam, I heard a Whoaaaaa. Hundreds of students were looking up at me in awe. I had just completed a four-hour exam in less than 40 minutes. People were blown away at how smart I must have been to have finished so fast. And little did they know that two days later my Economics professor handed back my exam and said, David, you scored a six out of 100. Thats not very good. And that was just the beginning of my week. The next day I received my grade on my first astronomy paper. I had better news to report. I upped my performance from an F in economics to a D+ in astronomy. And then my bad week continued on the football field. My parents and little brother were coming from Milwaukee to New Haven to watch me play football. And during practice the day before they arrived, I made one wrong turn and tore my hamstring. My family came to the game, but only to see me standing on the sidelines with crutches, instead of running with a football. Finally, the week came to an end with my new girlfriend telling me, David, Im pre-engaged to be married. Now I didnt know what pre-engaged meant, but I knew it couldnt be good. And it wasnt. All this happened in one week. And all I wanted to do was quit and head back to Wisconsin. But I didnt. Ask for help I reached out for help. I talked to my parents. I called my friends. I asked for their support, and they gave it to me. When I felt like a failure, they helped me regain my confidence. I then paid visits to my professors. I asked for their help, and they gave it to me. I followed their advice: I moved up a few rows in class, and I did my homework. And while it didnt work out with my girlfriend, and I never became a football star in college, I did turn my grades around. I eventually majored in economics. And I even graduated with the honor of carrying our college banner at graduation. Now its 21 years later and I am grateful that I learned to ask for help when I just wanted to quit and go home. Live your best life possible: Ask for help when you need it, and keep going to achieve your dreams.
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10/29/2010 1:43 PM
Stay in the Game Long Enough to Succeed Many people give up on their dreams. They face a challenge, or a series of setbacks, and then they question their ability to succeed. The payoff for their effort seems too far away to justify the frustration and disappointment they are experiencing today. But what if they hung in there just a little bit longer? Could the success they are striving for be just around the corner? Twenty-seven years ago A high school friend of mine, Big John, recently reminded me of an event that took place 27 years ago in our high school gym. He wrote about it in our high school anniversary alumni program. Big John said it was one of his best high school memories. Its a simple story about what can happen when you stay in the game. I was a sophomore in high school when I joined the Saturday morning basketball league. I played on my friend Sals team. And we had a good enough season to play for the championship against Johnny Malos (all names are changed for this story) team the team that taunted us all week before the game that they had a big plan to shut us down. Well, championship Saturday came and their big plan was working . . . on me! I was having my worst game of the season I couldnt make a basket. It was the rest of the team that kept us in the game. So, it came down to the last 10 seconds of the game and we were tied. And who had the ball? Johnny Malo. Johnny Malo took the ball down court, passed it to Frank, who dribbled around two of our guys, put up a jump shot, and with one second remaining, he made it! We were down by two, and Johnny Malo was jumping up and down like he was a contestant on the The Price Is Right. Our last chance So with one second left on the clock, we took our last timeout and huddled around Sal to hear his plan. And this was what he said, Throw it to the open guy. What? I said. What kind of plan is that? Throw it down to Big John. See, Big John was the only one of us over six feet tall and he was a good ballplayer. But, then Sal said, Nah, throw it to the open guy. So we ran back on the court and Earl stood on the side trying to pass the ball in bounds. I ran to the far corner of the court to give Big John as much room as possible; I still wanted him to get the pass. And what do you think Earl did? Correct. He threw the ball to me the guy farthest from the basket, and the one who only made two baskets all game long. The shot So I jumped high to catch the pass, grabbed it with two hands, swung the ball in front of me and let it fly. The gym was quiet as we all watched the ball arc high and toward the hoop. And then as the ball started descending in the direction of the basket the silence of the crowd was replaced with a rising chorus of ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh yeaaaaahhh! The ball went in. We couldnt believe it a threepointer to win the game and the championship. The place went nuts. And 27 years later, Big John wrote about this moment in our alumni program. We both knew that I had wanted to take myself out of that game. I had lost my confidence; I thought I had already taken enough shots. But I stayed in the game and I was given one more opportunity to make one of the most memorable shots of my life. I learned that you have to stay in the game long enough to succeed. What game are you playing in? Your shot may be just around the corner.
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10/29/2010 1:43 PM
Look for Treasure: Your Key to Success When I was growing up in Milwaukee, the largest electronics superstore in the area was a company called American TV. And the owner, Len Mattioli, was famous in Wisconsin. He was known as Crazy TV Lenny and he was constantly pitching his store on radio and television. He was always yelling in his ads: Buy a washer, get a bike! Buy a TV, get a bike! He hawked his products at full volume. Dads view One day I said to my father, Dad, this guy is nuts. Hes always yelling! And my father said to me, David, hes a good businessman. My dad was right: Dad could see American TVs business growing quickly. Mattioli did more than yell. Crazy TV Lenny found a way to draw people into his business. In fact, Mattioli took the original store and turned it into a chain of 15 electronics superstores in the Midwest. Bills view I met Bill Zito when I was in high school, the summer before we both left Milwaukee for Yale University. One day we were sitting in the upper grandstand at the old County Stadium watching the Milwaukee Brewers play. I was asking him about all the players. Bill knew them: He had been the Brewers official batboy. So, I asked him: Whats Cecil Cooper like? Bill said: Excellent guy. How about Paul Molitor? Excellent guy. And what about Robin Yount? Super-excellent guy. And this is how the conversation went as I talked to Bill about half the roster. I was surprised that everyone was an excellent guy. We have all heard so much in the news about professional ballplayers. I thought at least someone would not be so great. But in Bills eyes, everyone I asked about was an excellent or a super-excellent guy. Bill knew something about talent: He is now a sports agent with 40 professional hockey players on his roster. Prestons view Twenty years ago in New York City, I was with my good friend Preston Kevin Lewis. We were looking for music in a record store when a song began to play. I leaned over the record bin and said, I dont like this music. And Preston quietly said, It doesnt do a lot for me, and kept looking through the stack of records. While the song I pointed out wasnt his favorite, Preston didnt spend any time focusing on the music he didnt like; instead he searched for the music he did like. Preston now works for Warner Brothers, after stints with HBO Home Video, MTV and Disney. A lesson learned: Find the treasures I remember these stories because they are woven together in a lesson that has stuck with me over the past two decades: When you look for the good, and when you expect the good, you find the good. When you want to learn something new, theres a treasure to be found. I learned that its easy to be a critic. You can find fault with anything. The challenge is to sift through life looking for brilliance, opportunities and lessons to be learned. This week So, this week observe yourself assessing the day-to-day events of your life and the people you encounter. What do you say to yourself about them? What do you say to others? Then, heres the big question: When you make these comments publicly or privately, ask yourself: What am I learning right now? Do my comments and observations help me understand why someone is successful, why a business grows and how a product sells? You will likely discover that your quick criticisms seldom lead you anywhere; they close the doors of your curiosity and creativity. Your life will remain as it is. But when you tune your mind to look for the hidden treasures in life, you will discover lessons that you can apply to your own goals and dreams. You will advance your life. Be a treasure hunter in life; the rewards are great.
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10/29/2010 1:44 PM
Good Problems to Have From the time I entered kindergarten until my sophomore year in college, I played football. It was my passion. And to get bigger and stronger, I began to lift weights the summer before my freshman year in high school. Over the next six years, I worked out regularly. And I worked out hard. I put on muscle and I gained strength, and it came as a result of thousands of hours of training. It was not easy, but it was worth it. Too big? One thing that always made me laugh during my training years was when someone who was not exercising regularly would tell me: I dont lift weights because I dont want to get too big. I would just smile whenever someone said that to me. They had no idea that the problem they envisioned would not happen overnight. In fact, it would take more time and effort than they could ever have imagined. There may be other reasons not to lift weights, but getting too big is not one of them. Getting too big is what I call a good problem to have. Your journey to bigness would involve regularly going to the gym, eating right, sleeping well and getting healthy. And if your muscles really did start popping out of your gym clothes, you could use the mirror to guide you on how much you needed to ease up on the weights. There are problems we definitely dont want, and there are problems that are good to have. We just need to look at the good problems differently. Too in-demand? I love being with my wife, Dawn, and my little girls, Eliana and Ariela. You can guess that I prefer not to travel more than I have to for business. So I catch myself saying, I dont want to be a road warrior who measures his success by the number of speaking engagements he has all over the country. I dont want to be speaking all the time. What is this? Its a good problem to have. Whats a better way to look at it? I want my writing and speaking to be so much in demand that I can choose which of all those available speaking dates I want to accept and which ones I can say no to (even though I am grateful for all the opportunities). Too popular? Heres another one of mine. I prefer to spend my professional time writing, researching, speaking, recording and filming my work. So I find myself saying, I dont want to spend all my time corresponding on the social and business networking sites like Facebook, MySpace, and Linked In. What is this? Its a good problem to have. Heres a better way to look at it: I want my columns, books, workbooks, CD programs, DVDs and products to make such a positive impact on peoples lives that I am invited to connect with more and more people from all around the world. And you can bet that given all of this interest in my work, I would make sure that I had a strategy to communicate with everyone. Too much money? And heres one I hear a lot of people saying: I dont want to make a lot of money if it means sacrificing the good things in my life. What is this? Yes, its another good problem to have. Heres another way to look at it: I want to be so good at what I love doing that people will pay me handsomely to do it. Ill then continue to do what I love, and Ill have all the time I want to spend with family and friends. Your good problems Now, what do you say negatively about the things that could possibly make your life even more wonderful? What are your good problems to have? How could you change your view of them? Consider re-orienting your imagination from the downside of success to the upside of opportunity. Another approach to the same issue could produce an eventual breakthrough for you. Remember, some problems are good to have.
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10/29/2010 1:44 PM
Your Success Mission, Part I: We All Need Help Think about it: What are some of your lifes achievements? Its OK. No ones watching. Go ahead. What accomplishments make you proud of yourself? Your achievements. Now ask yourself, how many of your life accomplishments did you achieve completely on your own? Let me answer that question for you. The answer is none. Our successes always come with help. So, answer this question: Who were the people who contributed to each of your successes? Pause to think about these people. Now, Ill bet youre feeling a bit of gratitude right now. You have just reminded yourself how important others have been to you in your life. You have not traveled alone. Now, most of us feel some amount of stress when we think about what it will take to achieve our dreams. We think, How in the world are we going to get from where we are to where we hope to be? Luckily, the answer is not alone. Other people will help us. The first answer. So, whats the best way to achieve your life goals? Heres the first answer. Look to the people who have already helped you. Reach out to them. Tell them why they are important to you and how they helped you succeed in the past. Let these people know how valuable they are to you. If you feel that youve thanked someone before, consider doing it again in an even more meaningful way. Keep these people in your corner. University of Michigan psychologist Christopher Peterson wrote in his book, A Primer in Positive Psychology, In our experience with many dozens of gratitude letters . . . they work 100 percent of the time in the sense that the recipient is moved, often to tears, and the sender is gratified as well. The gratitude factor. Gratitude researcher Robert Emmons recently reviewed the growing evidence that feelings of gratitude improve the quality of our lives. In one study he found that people who wrote up to five things for which they were grateful or thankful on a weekly basis exercised more regularly, reported fewer physical symptoms, felt better about their lives as a whole, and were more optimistic about the upcoming week. Positive Psychology co-founder Martin Seligman of the University of Pennsylvania, along with his colleagues, also discovered that when people took a few minutes each evening to write down three good things that happened to them during the day, their happiness increased and their depressive symptoms decreased. Emmons found in another study that people who feel gratitude are more likely to help others. Emmons wrote, Gratitude leads not only to feeling good, but also to doing good. This week: There are three parts to your mission this week.
1. Write down two to three of your greatest

achievements. Briefly describe what you accomplished.
2. Think about the principal people who helped you on

your path to these achievements. Take a few minutes to deeply reflect: Who made your successes possible? You may find that some non-obvious names will surface. More people help us in life than we often realize. Have you properly thanked all of these people? If you have not, consider reaching out to them over the next few months in a way that would be meaningful to them.
3.
Join us next week for Part II of your success mission. It will make a positive difference in your life.
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10/29/2010 1:45 PM
Your Success Mission, Part II! We All Need Help Last week we talked about how most of us feel some amount of stress when we think about what it will take to achieve our dreams. We think, How in the world are we going to get from where we are today to where we hope to be? The first answer Heres the essence of the first answer I shared with you in Part I. Look to the people who have already helped you. Reach out to them. Tell them why they are important to you and how they helped you succeed in the past. Let these people know how valuable they are to you. If you feel that youve thanked someone before, consider doing it again in an even more meaningful way. Keep these people in your corner. The second answer Now, whats the second answer? Help other people. Helping others Think about who else could help you achieve the success you desire. Now, through a lens of gratitude, consider how you could repay these people in advance for their support. What could you do for them now? How could you help them in some way? Your commitment to helping them will demonstrate two things: You care about what they care about, and you appreciate the role they could play in your life. This week So, lets think about the people you want to bring into your life. Follow these three steps:
1. Who are the people that could make a difference in

your life the people who could really help you if you could make a connection with them? Write their names down now.
2. Now, heres the key: Beside each name on your list,

write down what you could do for them that would be valuable and helpful. What could you do that would be meaningful?
3. Now, grab your planner and write what youre going to

do for whom and when. Building relationships takes time. Start reaching out to people now. Offer your thoughtful assistance. Stand out When you do, you will stand out as a giver, and leave the takers of the world standing in line. Your new contacts will be grateful to you. Gratitude and giving will lead to your success.
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10/29/2010 1:45 PM
Dont Let Telemarketers Make You Mad Over the last few years I have heard more and more people complain about the telemarketing calls they receive at home, and now increasingly on their cell phones. I can understand why. I dont like my dinner interrupted for a sales call, a marketing survey or a political poll either. The challenge Ive noticed, however, is how we respond to these calls. I often hear people boast about how they handle telemarketers. Each time they receive a call from a telemarketer, they shout: Take me off your list! Or they put the phone up to a radio and crank up the volume to give it back to the representative calling them. Or they say, Give me your home phone number and Ill call you! In each instance they are pleased that they stuck it to the telemarketer. There are two main problems with this approach. First, telemarketers are moms, dads, sons, daughters, brothers, sisters, students: They are anyone who needs that job. And according to the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics, there are more than 2.2 million customer service representatives, and more than 350,000 telemarketers in this country alone. I know many of the people who work in these organizations, and I worked with them when I ran customer service centers. Theyre good people. It is not fair to vent our frustration on them; theyre just doing their job. And we often forget that many of the telemarketers who call us are volunteers. They are members of grassroots organizations that support our democracy. They encourage us to get involved in important causes, and they push us to get out and vote. Other people see it as their duty to make calls for their university, high school, nonprofit or local public radio and television stations. Now, we still may not want to receive these calls, no matter what the cause. So what do we do? I asked a director of a telemarketing company what is a fair and respectful way of letting a telemarketer know that we are not interested. Here was her advice: Honesty works best. You can just say: I support the other candidate. I do not support your cause. I already have your product. I do not give money over the phone. And you can politely interrupt the agent if they start reading a script. Say your few words, and then hang up the phone. When they know that you are truly not interested as opposed to saying youre busy they will not waste their time calling you back. Heres another approach. Remember that most telemarketing companies use automatic dialers to serve up calls to a customer service agent. Youll find that there is a delay between when you say hello and when an agent is connected to you. A simple way of avoiding the call is to hang up as soon as you hear the pause: Youll save yourself, and the agent, time and frustration. But what do we do if we really want to stop or reduce all these telemarketing calls? Go where the power is. Representatives in companies do not set policies and procedures. Leaders do. Talk to them. And if we want to limit the ability of telemarketers to do business, we should lobby our telecommunications providers, or advocate for change with our politicians. The second problem with venting our anger every time we receive a telemarketing call is that we are virtually guaranteeing ourselves a daily dose of frustration. We are likely going to receive these calls for some time to come. So rather than get worked up each time we pick up the phone, we are better to let the telemarketers go on their way without conflict. And then, with no hesitation, we can put our attention right back on what matters most to us in our lives.
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10/29/2010 1:46 PM
Turn Off the Sirens and Forgive Do you know that overwhelming feeling when a police siren goes off right behind you? You immediately feel the pounding of your heart in your chest and throat. You think, What did I do? Was I driving over the speed limit? Did I go through a red light? Was I swerving? Did I cut someone off? Most of us know this experience. And we are always relieved when it turns out that we are not the intended target of the police officer. Sixteen years ago I heard a police siren blaring behind me . . . and it was for me! I was in Merida, Mexico and I was being pulled over by a local officer. And I had no idea why. My mom was in the front seat, and my dad in the back. I had taken my parents to Mexico on a dream vacation. I wanted to show them Mexicos ancient Mayan ruins and beautiful cities. I wanted them to experience the delicious cuisine and the colorful culture. And here we were on the side of the road watching a police officer approach our vehicle. I rolled down my window when the police officer arrived at the side of our car. He said in Spanish, You will come to the police station. You broke the law. I spoke Spanish, so I responded, What did I do? He said, You made a wrong turn. I knew this was not good: You never want a run-in with the police. Mexico is a wonderful country, but its police forces in that era were feared because of widespread corruption. How could a simple traffic mistake lead us to the inside of a police station? It was not fair. And I was worried. I pleaded with the officer, I am so sorry. I did not see a sign. Im showing my parents beautiful Mexico. Were visiting friends in this town. Please excuse us. It will not happen again. My parents were echoing my plea, por favor senor, por favor senor. His stare was steady. He did not move. He was not budging. No, you will come with me, he said. I made a mistake and this officer was going to make me pay. His judgment was my jury, and the price to be paid was down at the station. That is until two middle-aged women walking nearby took up our case. They said, How can you take a nice tourist and his parents to jail because of a minor and innocent mistake? The women continued, Dont give our country a bad name. Be forgiving and let them go. He stared at the women as they spoke. Then he turned his gaze on us. And with the flip of his hand, he said, Go. In a release of intense emotion, we thanked the officer profusely. We then put our hands together in a prayer-like fashion and said thank you to the kind women who helped us. How many times in your life have you felt unfairly judged? You did something unintentionally that was blown out of proportion. Your mistake damned you to a judgment that you were a bad person: You were viewed as insensitive, uncaring and unkind. And while you regretted whatever you had done, you felt violated because the judgment seemed so unbalanced: Your good intentions, your kind heart and your normally good behavior were not even being considered. You felt like I did in my car when the police officer pulled me over and said, You will come to the station. You broke the law. This is how we feel when other people do not let our small infractions pass them by. When they decide instead that we are bad people, we feel abused. And this is what we do to others when we damn them for their fleeting mistakes, rather than display real-time forgiveness and let them go. We make the world a better place when we forsake our judgments and afford others our forgiveness.
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10/29/2010 1:46 PM
What Videos Are You Playing in Your Mind? Events in our lives, and our interpretations of them, play like a continuous stream of short videos in our minds. The video projector is always running. Something is always playing on the screen. And many of these videos feature the trying times of our lives. There is often a video stored in our memories of almost everyone who has ever hurt, embarrassed, worried, insulted, frustrated, angered or disappointed us. Florida State University psychology researcher Roy Baumeister and his colleagues, in their paper Bad is Stronger than Good, wrote: The greater power of bad events over good ones is found in everyday events . . . Bad emotions, bad parents, and bad feedback have more impact than good ones, and bad information is processed more thoroughly than good . . . Bad impressions and bad stereotypes are quicker to form and more resistant to disconfirmation than good ones . . . Taken together, these findings suggest that bad is stronger than good, as a general principle across a broad range of psychological phenomena. So, heres the challenge: The bad videos of our lives can start playing at the slightest suggestion or provocation. One moment were fine, the next moment were thinking about something bad that happened to us many years ago. Reliving the past And when our negative memories are invoked, we often indulge them. We look for new meaning. We contemplate them. We re-analyze what happened. And our bodies respond: We often feel the experience as if it were happening again. Our gut tightens, our breathing shallows and our body tenses. We then take on the mood of the original event. Let me give you an example of this phenomenon. And well start with a positive one. Consider for a moment a wonderful event in your life. Pause, close your eyes, and remember in as much detail as possible the time you proposed, your child was born, the day you graduated or any other highlight of your life. Take a minute to reflect on the event. Now, how did that memory make you feel? What did you see? What did you smell? What did you taste? What was it like to re-connect with that memory? Did it make you smile, laugh or just feel good? Its likely that your mind took you on a journey back to the original experience. Suffering the past If only we were to savor the good memories more regularly, we would be happier. The challenge is that our mind tends to search for and focus on re-runs of the bad things in our past, versus the good. We suffer the consequences of the difficult times in our lives all over again. And as we engage these memories as they pass through our consciousness when we wake up, go to bed, experience stress, or even in the middle of a happy time we strengthen them. We feel all over again the initial mood of disappointment, anxiety, and doubt. And by energizing these old memories with new thinking, we give them more importance in our lives. Scientists Daniel Gilbert of Harvard, and Martin Seligman of the University of Pennsylvania, each has reported that our memories are really just memories of the last memory of our experience. So, every time we recall an event in our lives, we are not going back to review the original footage. We are instead referencing our last recollection of the event. How do you move beyond negative memories? Next week I will guide you through a powerful way of letting these bad memories go. Our goal is to free ourselves of the bad events of our past and focus our attention and energy on what matters most to us now.
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10/29/2010 1:47 PM
How to Take the Power Away from Bad Memories Our brain automatically tries to keep us safe. We are wired not to hurt or kill ourselves. The challenge is that the brain has an alarm system that can be hypersensitive. We often receive physical and emotional alerts to warn us of problems that pose no real threat. As a result, we are left to respond to psychological and physical false alarms. Memories often trigger fear In a paper titled Memories of Fear, How the Brain Stores and Retrieves Physiologic States, Feelings, Behaviors and Thoughts from Traumatic Events, Bruce Perry M.D., Ph.D., psychiatrist and former Chief of Psychiatry at Texas Children's Hospital, wrote: The remarkable capacity of the brain to take a specific event and generalize, particularly with regard to threatening stimuli, makes humans vulnerable to the development of false associations and false generalizations from a specific traumatic event to other non-threatening situations. Essentially, events in our lives that have long since passed can continue to exact their toll by triggering fear in us. Waking up happy Most days I wake up feeling happy. Why? The answer is simple: Its because I get to wake up to the warm embrace and beautiful voice of my wife, Dawn, each morning. Dawn wakes me up so that I can wake up my little girls and make their breakfast before they go to school. I cherish my morning wake-up routine. While some days I wake up a little tired, I still feel happy: I am focused on what I care about. Waking up with random memories Contrast these typical mornings when I am home with the days when Im traveling on business. It is not uncommon for me to wake up with memories of 20 years ago, a random thought or a feeling I cannot explain. And many of these thoughts are negative. I wake up thinking about the money I lost years ago on a bad financial decision. Or a time when I blew a presentation. Or when I failed a test in school. Or when I made a mistake in an important relationship. And then my unchaperoned brain automatically starts searching for evidence of whether Im still making bad financial decisions, or Im still not studying enough, etc. And, if Im not careful, my unattended brain will find some shred of evidence to build its negative case. And the result is that the initial bad memory or random thought captures my attention and then sets the tone for my day. What can we do? The first key is to recognize that our brains will continue to send us unconscious warning signals every day of our lives. The second key is to understand that our initial emotional reaction to these warnings may also be subconsciously activated by the memories our brain associates with the alarm. Positive Psychology researcher Jonathan Haidt, Ph.D., in his book The Happiness Hypothesis, writes about the research by social psychology researcher Dan Wegner, Ph.D.: Automatic processes generate thousands of thoughts and images every day, often through random association. The ones that get stuck are the ones that particularly shock us, the ones we try to suppress or deny. The third and final key is to realize that there is no need to engage all these negative memories: We do not have to reflect and analyze them each time they surface. A time to smile, wave, wish them well and move on Thankfully, I discovered the power of applying The Law of the Garbage Truck to bad memories (see my column on October 29, 2007, or go to www.bewareofgarbagetrucks.com). I do not suppress or deny my memories and random thoughts: I just smile, wave, wish them well, and I move on. There comes a time in our lives when we must let our bad memories pass us by. We must not let our past reduce our joy, our confidence, or belief in what is good and possible in our lives. We can live our best possible life now.
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Dont Invent Future Problems I cried the night before my first day of kindergarten: I was worried. Would I make new friends? Would my teachers be nice? Would I like school? My mom has often told me that I loved kindergarten. When it was time for the first grade, I cried again. I had similar worries. Would I be with my friends? Would I like my new teacher? Would school be harder? I recently saw my first grade report card. Mrs. Philosophous said that I was a happy child and I enjoyed class. Fortunately, I did not cry again before the start of another school year. However, over the years I have worried about the future and what changes and challenges I might face. The problem I endured for many years was that I invented obstacles in my future people and things that could make life difficult for me. Something in my life a mood, an event or an interaction with someone would trip a switch in me and my thinking would turn negative and unproductive. And although most of the projected encounters I feared never came to pass, the anxiety I experienced along the way was upsetting and unnecessary. Psychologists Karen Reivich and Andrew Shatte wrote in their book, The Resilience Factor, about the perils of catastrophic thinking when we play out the worst possible scenarios: For many people, their anxiety takes over and they catastrophize they dwell on a current adversity and within a few minutes have imagined a chain of disastrous events stretching into the future. Now, we must all spend time thinking about the future. We have to commit to the success we seek, and be prepared when we run into challenges. This requires that we envision what lies ahead for us. But ruminating about scenarios that only end poorly never helps us accomplish anything. It just takes our attention away from enjoying what we have today and planning for what we want tomorrow. One day my father helped me see the issues I was imagining in my future. Dad told me an old story to make the point. Heres how he told it. A guy is driving through the desert when one of his tires blows out. He gets out of his car and pops open the trunk to look for a spare tire and a jack. He sees the spare, but theres no jack. Oh s*#&!, he yells. Ive got to walk back to the gas station I passed five miles ago! So he starts walking. I hope he has a jack, he says to himself. Halfway there he mumbles anxiously, He better have a jack. When hes almost there he growls, That son of a b#@t% better let me use his jack! Minutes later he finally arrives at the gas station. Hes hot. Hes frustrated. Hes fuming. He sees the station owner in the garage and he walks up to him and says, Hey buddy! You can forget it! Keep your g#@ d@% jack! He turns around and marches five miles back to his car . . . with no jack. And then this is when Dad looked at me, smiled and warned: Dont build a Jack Story. We gain nothing by conjuring up and replaying our worst visions of how people might be unkind, unhelpful and unfriendly to us. We only create problems where they do not exist. Events in our lives trigger negative, unhelpful thoughts. It happens to all of us. This is the human condition. Its natural. The key is not to fixate on these thoughts when they appear. There is no need to fight or block them. We do not need to invest unwanted thoughts with any additional energy. We just need to apply The Law of the Garbage Truck (see my column on October 29, 2007, or go to www.bewareofgarbagetrucks.com) and smile, wave, wish them well and move on. Follow The Law and free yourself to focus on what really matters.
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10/29/2010 1:48 PM
Revenge Does Not Pay Many people spend their lives trying to get back at people. They feel abused, challenged or violated, so their mission is to hit back someday. They often think about what they could have said or should have done. And they fantasize about revenge. They become movie directors: They imagine a scene where they get to talk like the hero of big action movie: You just messed with the wrong guy. I just became your worst nightmare! And then, in their dream scene they stick it to the person that hurt them. And even better, they watch it all in slow motion to extend the joy of evening the score. And their scene ends with their walking triumphantly into the distance with victory music playing in the background. Why? They just carried out justice. But reality plays out differently than in the movies. Positive Psychology co-founder, Martin Seligman, in his book Authentic Happiness, speaks directly to the pitfalls of lashing back at people who have crossed us. Seligman wrote: Dwelling on trespass and the expression of anger produces more cardiac disease and more anger . . . The overt expression of hostility turns out to be the real culprit in the Type-A heart attack link. Time urgency, competitiveness, and the suppression of anger do not seem to play a role in Type A people getting more heart disease. In one study, 255 medical students took a personality test that measured overt hostility. As physicians 25 years later, the angriest had roughly five times as much heart disease as the least angry ones. In another study, men who had the highest risk of later heart attacks were just the ones with more explosive voices, more irritation when forced to wait, and more outwardly directed anger. Revenge does not pay. It ultimately brings us more pain. It does nothing to improve our happiness and peace of mind. We suffer the original offense again and again when we give it attention and importance in our lives. Wanting to exact revenge only assures us of continued anger, frustration and disappointment in our lives. In a paper published in the journal of Aggression and Violent Behavior, psychologists Tara Galovski and Edward Blanchard of the State University of New York at Albany wrote: . . . the impact of anger, aggression, hostility, and related behaviors on society is enormous. Anger and aggression in the workplace, schools, on the streets, in airplanes, and on the roadways appear to be becoming increasingly commonplace. You only have to drive on the highway for a week to see how people try to teach each other lessons. Many people wont let driving transgressions pass them by. They feel they have to hold all the guilty drivers accountable. So when someone makes a bad move driving, they lay on the horn, they tailgate, they yell, they wave wildly or they cut them off in return. This type of behavior is not only bad for their health, as the research confirms, it puts other people at risk. And their focus on revenge ratchets up the potential for harm for everyone around them. Galovski and Blanchard took a particularly hard look in their paper at the deadly impact of road rage. Research has shown that drivers who are currently experiencing major life stressors are five times more likely to cause fatal accidents than drivers who were relatively free from serious life stressors. In essence, when we center our lives on revenge, we burden the health and happiness of others and ourselves. Revenge does not pay. It carries a great price.
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10/29/2010 1:48 PM
Ask for Help Without Dumping One day my daughters and I were having fun on the play set in our backyard. Ariela was on the swing, and Eliana was climbing the ladder to the monkey bars when she stopped and said, Papi, whats this? She held up her right hand so that I could see it. It was all orange and covered with speckles of green. I walked over to her, and looked at her hand more closely. Then I noticed the rungs on the ladder. The paint was peeling, and the bars were flaking with rust. I said, Eliana, please get down. Honey, thats rust. I dont want you to hurt your hands. And then I looked up at the monkey bars. Four of the nine bars had the same issue! I felt myself getting angry. I started talking to myself. I paid a lot for this swing set and its already rusting. I kept on talking. My girls are four and five, this is dangerous. How could they sell me equipment like this? I got even angrier. And in two weeks Ariela has 30 classmates coming to her birthday party. I looked at my watch. It was after hours. Too bad, I said. It cant wait! I need to call them now. No one messes with my family. So, I marched in and called the company. I got their voicemail. I left a long message. I covered all the main points: My swing set is full of rust. This product is inferior. Its not safe. How can my daughters play on it? And I have 30 kids coming to play on the swing set in less than two weeks . . . and almost 40 parents will be here! And I closed by saying, I expect a call at 9 a.m. when you open! I walked out to rejoin my girls: I thought that I had just taken care of them. I did what I had to do. The company knew that I meant business. And then a few minutes later I realized something. In my fury, I had allowed myself to become someone elses Garbage Truck. I came out swinging in my message. I did not give the company the benefit of the doubt: I declared myself an adversary. I didnt consider that the owner and his team might want to help. My anger blinded me to that possibility. But my parents taught me something growing up about mistakes. Mom and Dad would say: When youre wrong, admit it. When youre out of line, say youre sorry. So I went back inside and left another message. I apologized for my first call. And then I took a different approach. This time I said: We like our swing set. We use it a lot. And were excited that Arielas friends will play on it during her birthday party. And I am confident that you will fix everything in time. Call me as soon as you can tomorrow. Sure enough, the owner of the company called me the next day. He was friendly and direct. He let me know what parts were under warranty. He then said he would waive the labor on the repairs if I would cover the rest of the material costs. I agreed. And just in time for the party, all the fixes were made. I tipped the four guys who did the job, and then I called the owner. I told him, You did what you said you would do. You delivered. And your guys did a great job. Thanks. I was reminded again that my initial issue was not really with the company. It was with fellow human beings. When I assumed the worst and left my first message, I dumped garbage on them. When I was friendly and respectful, I made their jobs easier and more enjoyable. We all deserve the good service we pay for. But we must remember that people like us run companies, sell products, and offer customer service: We should never dehumanize our interaction with them. We should treat people the way we want to be treated. We make the world a better place when we ask for help without dumping garbage.
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10/29/2010 1:49 PM
Let It Pass You By: Letting Go Is Not Good Enough
Two years after my grandmother passed away, my moms father we called him Bumpa suffered his fourth stroke. And with it came the acceleration of dementia. At times Bumpa would seem completely lucid. He would be his normal, loving, fun self. And at other times, he seemed to be missing something entirely. We would see a side of him never displayed earlier in his life. In these moments he would say things that were insensitive, selfish and unkind. This was not the father my mom knew, and it hurt her. It was as though she had to swallow a bitter pill each time Bumpa acted out. Mom tried to do so much for Bumpa. On three separate occasions, Mom asked him to live with us. Mom and Dad would set him up with his own bedroom and bathroom. Mom would cook for him, wash his clothes, and take him around with her. Bumpa would be cared for in every way. Mom loved her father very much. And each time it seemed that he was going to stay, Bumpa would end up defiantly saying, Why are you keeping me here? I only want to live in my own home. The problem was that Bumpa was no longer capable of caring for himself. So Mom and my aunt did whatever they could to arrange the care Bumpa needed. But it was hard to satisfy him. Bumpa just wasnt himself. He would often lash out if you did not do what he wanted. And this was hard on Mom and her sister. One weekend Mom and Dad came to visit me in New York City. Mom was particularly distressed about Bumpa. She just could not get him out of her mind. Mom had tried to let go of the hurt she had been feeling. Mom read philosophy, she would go for walks, she would talk to my dad and she would share her experiences with me. But the hurt kept coming from Bumpa faster than Mom could ever let it go. So, one night after we returned to my apartment from dinner, I sat up late talking with Mom. I tried to help Mom realize how much she had been doing for Bumpa. I wrote out a list of everything I could think of that she had done and was doing for him. I wanted her to have a list with her at all times that affirmed the wonderful care she was providing for her father. Mom needed to know that she was a good daughter. The list was our evidence that no matter what my grandfather might say during his dementia-induced episodes, Mom was doing all she could for him. It was then that Mom made the switch in her life. She knew Bumpa was suffering from dementia and that it would only get worse. She knew her father was often not in control of what he thought and said. So whenever he would begin one of his uncontrollable rants, rather than take in his hurtful comments only to have to let go of them later Mom began to let them pass by. She did not take Bumpa to task for everything he said. Whenever she saw her father acting like a garbage truck, she would let him pass by with kindness and love. And the more Mom did this with Bumpa, the happier she was. She relieved herself of a great burden. Her love for her father allowed Mom to let the difficult interactions with him pass by, so she could focus on the best of what Bumpa still had to give. And this allowed Mom the freedom to be the best mother, wife, friend and daughter she could be. We are happier, and we have more to give to others when we stop taking the bad things in and then having to let them go later. Bumpa lived until he was 90 years old. He lived a good life. Bumpa loved his family. His family loved him. And Mom was at peace when he passed away. She had been kind to him. Mom saw the good in him, and let the rest pass her by.
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I Made My Pledge Last year something happened to me at work. Someone upset me, and it put me in a bad mood. It threw my whole day off course. I was not myself. I was impatient with others. And it was hard for me to concentrate. And then suddenly I realized that I had 20 minutes to make a 30-minute trip to my older daughters summer camp. Five-year-old Eliana was participating in a presentation in front of all the children, counselors and parents. I dropped what I was doing, flew out of my office and ran to my car. I tore out of the parking lot and drove as fast as I could manage, darting in and out of lanes and rushing through yellow lights turning to red. I was frustrated each time someone drove slowly in front of me, and when I had to stop for a red light. And as I drove, I did nothing but stare at the traffic and look at the clock. And all the while I mumbled, How could I be late? How could I be late? When I finally arrived at the camp, I had to snake around the busy parking lot looking for a spot. When I finally found a space, I leapt out of my car and ran to the auditorium. When I arrived at the door, someone pointed to where my wife, Dawn, was sitting with my younger daughter, four-year-old Ariela. I quickly walked down the aisle to their row. I stepped over and around everyones knees and feet on the way to my seat. And I blocked their view as I passed by. When I finally made it, I sat down and I looked at my watch. I was nine minutes late. I leaned over and I kissed Ariela, and I kissed Dawn. I whispered, Im sorry. Dawn smiled. I leaned back into Dawn and said, Did I miss anything? And Dawn said, Eliana was just brought on stage to recite the opening prayer in front of the whole camp. Did she see you? I said. She looked right at us and waved. Nine minutes. I sat there thinking, How could I have missed it? Eliana looked out and saw her Mom and sister. And I wasnt there. And for what? I just stared straight ahead. The next day on the way to work, I thought about what had happened. How could I have missed my daughters big moment? And then it hit me. I had let a Garbage Truck run right over me and ruin my day. But worse yet, I became the Garbage Truck. I turned into a Garbage Truck at work, when I drove aggressively to the presentation, when I left Dawn and Ariela sitting by themselves, and when I stepped in front of people in the auditorium. And worst of all, I was a Garbage Truck when I missed my daughters moment in the spotlight. I had taken someone elses garbage and spread it to others, and to the people I love the most. I knew about Garbage Trucks, and I became one anyway. I knew then that I had to make a pledge to myself. I had to stop accepting garbage in my life and I had to stop spreading it to others. I could not be a Garbage Truck. So, I pulled my car to the side of the road, pulled out a pen, grabbed a piece of paper, and I wrote this pledge. I do not accept garbage in my life. When I see Garbage Trucks I do not take them personally. I just smile. I wave. I wish them well. And I move on. And I do not spread garbage to others. I am not a Garbage Truck! I do not accept garbage in my life. I said my pledge out loud, and I said it over and over again. I put it to memory. I shared it with Dawn. I shared it with my parents. I shared it with my friends and I shared it with my team members. I put a copy in my wallet, in my planner, on my desk and on my office wall. And then I put The Pledge to work in my life. When I saw a
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And then I put The Pledge to work in my life. When I saw a Garbage Truck coming my way, I would say The Pledge to myself, often in short-hand: I am not a Garbage Truck, or I do not take them personally, or I just smile, wave, wish them well and I move on. And when I would catch myself in a bad mood at work, or at home, I would repeat: I do not spread Garbage to others, or I am not a Garbage Truck. The more I honored my No Garbage Trucks! Pledge, the happier I became. Every time I let a Garbage Truck pass me by, and each time I nipped my own garbage, I achieved greater freedom. I became free to enjoy every day. I became free to love and care about the people who matter most to me. I became free to focus on what is important in my life. I became free to live my best possible life. Last week Eliana had another event at camp. I was there early.
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10/29/2010 1:50 PM
You Know What They Say About Them The train was about to pull into the station, and I didnt know where to go. It was 1986. I had never been to Paris. And I only had the address of my hotel. I needed help. But I was hesitant to ask for it. I had heard from so many people before I left on my trip that the French were not very friendly, and that they did not particularly like Americans. One man had told me that, because he didnt speak French, a Parisian waiter would not serve him. Another person said that a museum cashier yelled at him because he took too long to pay. And one woman told me that, in general, it was hard to get help when people found out that you were an American. They just dont like us very much, she said. Well, it was my time to find out for myself. I needed directions. I had to reach out to someone. So I took a deep breath, practiced the few French phrases I knew, and gently tapped the shoulder of a French-speaking man standing near me in the aisle. Bonjour, I said. He turned, and said, Bonjour. I said in French, Excuse me. My name is David. I do not speak French. Do you speak English? Yes, he responded in a heavy French accent. Im Francois. I told Francois that I was visiting Paris for the first time and I needed directions. He saw the map I was holding and asked for it. Francois spent the next five minutes marking my map. He then reviewed the directions, and handed the map to me. I thanked him, he smiled and wished me a good trip. When I arrived at the station, I followed Francois directions. One-and-a-half hours later I arrived at the metro station near the hotel. I got off the train, stopped and looked at my map. The directions seemed to say that I should cross the plaza and turn down a narrow street. So, I took off walking and traveled for about five minutes when I realized I had gone the wrong way. It was after 11 p.m., the street was dimly lit and I wasnt sure where to go. I needed help once more. But what were the chances I would find another friendly French person ready to assist me? Based on what so many people had said prior to my trip, I wasnt sure. But it didnt matter. I was lost. Just then a man turned the corner onto my street. When he was just a few steps away from me, I launched into my little French script. Good evening. Excuse me. My name is David. I do not speak French. Do you speak English? A little, he said. I pointed to the address written on my map. The gentleman looked and said, Ahh . . . OK. He then glanced at his watch, turned to me and said, I take you there. And we turned around and went back toward the metro station. As we walked, we did our best to communicate with the little common vocabulary we shared. We kept walking until we crossed the metro station plaza and traveled six more blocks until we arrived at the small hotel where I was staying. Looking up at the address, he said, Here. I said, Merci beaucoup. He said, Your welcome. Au revoir. And we shook hands. Once again, someone had come to my aid in Paris. And what about the rest of my stay? Everyone I met was friendly, respectful and kind. The French were as gracious as any people I had ever met. I had a wonderful time. At the end of my trip I laughed at how nervous I was to ask for help the first night of my trip. I had let other people convince me that the French were always Garbage Trucks. I realized how easy it can be for others to convince us that the
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people we do not know are perpetual Garbage Trucks. We hear people make negative assessments of others and, if were not careful, we accept their opinion as truth. And this is wrong. We should challenge peoples assertions before we accept their negative views as fact. It is never right, nor helpful, to say that one group of people are Garbage Trucks all the time. We bring the world together when we get to know people ourselves, and let ungrounded and unbalanced judgments of others pass us by. We should commit to giving people the same chance that we would want others to give to us. Last year Dawn and I took my little girls and my parents to Paris. The best part of the trip was when someone stopped and asked me for directions.
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Dont Hide from Disappointment. Create a New Path. Football was my life. I had no other plans. Being a football player was my identity. When I was in the fifth grade, it was said that I was the fastest student ever to attend my elementary school. I won the Gold Medal in my intermediate school Olympics. I helped my high school football team win the conference championship by scoring on a 55-yard touchdown run, and I broke all our rushing records. And then, I was admitted to Yale University. I had a chance to play college football. When I arrived in training camp, the coaches put the depth chart of each position on the locker room wall. I walked over, looked up, and saw that I was eighth on the depth chart at running back. I couldnt believe it. I had always been the starter. Now, I was the backup to the seventh guy! So I worked as hard as anyone on the team to rise in the ranks, and one week prior to the start of the season, I became the backup to the starter. And in our first game of the season I was given the ball only once. I ran for eight yards. It wasnt much, but it was a start. The next week was better. The coaches gave me an opportunity to go head-to-head with the starter in practice. He would run a play. I would run a play. And that day I happened to be playing my best football ever. And then I ran a play that began the rest of my life. The quarterback made the call at the line, the center snapped the ball, and I took off running. I needed to unleash a good block I had to show the coaches how tough I was. I approached my target. I fixed my eyes on him. And as I began to uncoil and deliver my block, I heard a pop. And in an instant my right hamstring retracted into a ball of muscle. I fell to the ground clutching my leg. Worse than the pain, I realized that my season could be over. But I wouldnt give up. I did everything the trainers asked me to do. And three weeks after my injury, my trainers told me I was ready to sprint and start playing again. I didnt think so. There was tightness deep inside my leg that I couldnt quite loosen up. But the trainers knew better. That was their job. So I did what they said. They called out to me, Start jogging. And I did. They yelled, Start running. And I did. They hollered, Sprint! I took one step with my good leg, and then as I started my stride with my injured leg, I heard the sound of a giant rubber band snapping. I came crashing down. I knew it immediately: My season was over. But, I still wouldnt give up. I was a football player and I had to play football. So, I spent the rest of my freshman year rehabilitating my hamstring. I got myself into the best playing shape of my life. One week before my sophomore football season, I was working out on a high school track. I had one more sprint in my workout. I stepped up to the starting line and took off flying down the track. And when I was just steps from the finish line, I felt that snap again. I grabbed my hamstring and fell to the track. I knew it then. My football career was over. And for weeks I wanted to hide. I ran one football play for eight yards in college. That was it. That was my career. I didnt want to face anyone. I worried that people would think I was a failure. I had been a football player all my life. And now who was I? In todays economic turmoil, many of us are facing questions of identity, and most are significantly more difficult that the one I faced 24 years ago. People are reeling from unplanned and unwanted events. Life is hard when we get hurt, sick, divorced, laid off and fired and when we lose our money. And while we feel as though the whole world is watching us fail, the good news is that they really arent. People are thinking about their own challenges. Its only our closest family, friends and colleagues who are really concerned about us. They just want us to be happy, healthy and successful. And thats even better news. With their support, we dont need to hide.
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We can create a new path in life.
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Dont Get Distracted by Differences. Understand Them. Sixteen years ago in Spain, I was standing in a grocery store line. I had just started working in Malaga, the capital of the southern region, Andalucia. The store was small. People were in front of me and behind me. We were packed tightly together in a single-file line. Everyone was pretty much keeping to themselves, except for an occasional Hola or Buenos Dias. After a short wait, I reached a point where I could see two registers. I was next. There was barely any space between me and the two people who were checking out, and the counters were not large enough for me to unload my groceries. So, I did the only thing I could. I waited for the next available register. And then, I heard someone say in Spanish, Excuse me. Choose a line. I turned around and the man behind me was waving for me to advance. Choose a line, he said again. I looked at him. I looked at the registers. No one had moved. The customers were still checking out. I looked back at him, and again, he said, Choose a line. I smiled and said, Senor, Im already in line. Theres no room to go anywhere. The registers are busy. Ill move when one is free. And he said, No, you have to choose a line. How to form a line. Now, one thing I knew was how to form a line. I didnt need a tutorial. So, I said: Senor, Ill move as soon as a register is free. I was thinking, This guy must be having a bad day. Hes got a problem. That is until everyone behind him started nodding and said to me, Choose a line. Im not moving, I said to myself. Theres no need for me to get any closer to the customers in front of me. These guys just need to learn how to keep a line. I held my ground. I knew I was right. Finally, it was my turn. The cashier bagged my groceries, and I paid. I left the store and headed down the street with bags in both hands. I was still thinking about what happened. How could they all agree that I was lining up wrong? And then I stopped. I looked up and saw that all the street signs were in Spanish. The music playing around me was in Spanish. The conversations of the people walking past me were in Spanish. I started laughing. I said to myself, Im in Spain. If this is how they line up in Spain, Ill do it their way. Ill squeeze in. Ill hover. I dont have to teach everyone the way I do it. Understanding differences As it turned out, I learned that Spaniards in Malaga (Malagenos) have much looser rules about lining up than I was accustomed to. Sometimes just crowding around a cashier is acceptable. And you know something? People still get serviced. We often get distracted by the differences we see in the cultures, customs and habits of other peoples, organizations and countries. What seems odd to us bothers us. Thats not the way it should be done, we think. And then we get upset. I have learned that its better to try and understand a difference than to become frustrated and distracted by it. We need to keep our attention on whats important. In an increasingly interconnected world, the more we know and respect about each others customs and cultures the better our ability to work and live productively and harmoniously together. In 1999 I took my wife, Dawn, to Spain on our honeymoon. We had a wonderful time. And we even lined up in Malaga . . . their way.
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Three Questions to Get Your Children Really Talking How was school? What did you do today? These are some of the typical questions we ask our school-age children during dinner. The question is: How often do these questions lead to interesting and engaging answers? At some point in time, most of us have felt frustrated because we do not know the questions that will encourage our children to speak openly and meaningfully about their day. We want to know what is going on with them. We want to know what they are excited about. But questions that lead to answers such as fine, OK and I dont remember, do not help us learn more about our children. Here are three questions that may help you and your family. These questions may lead you to some interesting, meaningful and fun conversations at the dinner table with your children. Question #1 What was the top of your day? We know from psychology that our experience in life is based on where we focus our attention. We want to give our children an opportunity to recall something positive in their day. Make sure to explain that the top of their day is a time when they were most satisfied, challenged, happy or having fun. You can use this additional question to learn even more about what excites your children: Why was that the top of your day? Question #2 What did you learn today? Stanford psychology researcher Carol Dweck has spent decades researching what contributes most to our success in life. She sums up her findings in her book, Mindset: The New Psychology of Success. She wrote: If parents want to give their children a gift, the best thing they can do is to teach their children to love challenges, be intrigued by mistakes, enjoy effort and keep on learning. That way, their children dont have to be slaves of praise. They will have a lifelong way to build and repair their own confidence. When we ask our children what they learned today, we are demonstrating our interest in their growth. We are as concerned with their practice as we are with their performance. We are also communicating that we want to see them stretch themselves every day. Learning is key. Consider asking this follow-up question to further focus your child on the importance of learning: How did you learn that today? Question #3 What were you grateful for today? We do our children a great service when we help them understand the power of gratitude. We help them realize how many good things and how many good people are in their lives. Our question gently directs them to think of what they value and care about. Sociologist Georg Simmel wrote, Gratitude, as it were, is the moral memory of mankind. Our inquiry prods them to thank the people that help them. And we know from Positive Psychology research that the more grateful we are, the happier we become. Think about asking one of these questions to deepen your gratitude conversations: Why are you grateful for that? and What about that makes you grateful? Questions guide and stimulate The beauty of these three questions is that they stimulate our childrens thinking. And they can also influence our children subconsciously throughout the day: Our children know that we expect them to be grateful, find something good and learn something new every day. And dont forget to answer these questions yourself. Your children will understand whats important to you: You will model what you value. And you will personally feel the uplifting benefits of focusing on these three questions. Bon appetit!
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The Cover Band Career Question Cover bands play weddings. Cover bands play the party circuit. And cover bands play at local bars. Some of the best cover bands include some phenomenal musicians. These bands play other peoples music incredibly well. And if they are part of a great cover band, the members can make a nice, part-time living, usually complementing their day-job wages. The career question to ask ourselves is whether we will play other peoples songs for the rest of our lives, or will we develop our own songs. Will we be a cover band, or an original artist? This is the Cover Band Career Question. We all begin our careers learning and performing other peoples material. Going to school is a cover band journey: We learn what and how others think. We mimic their work in class, after school clubs, teams and troupes. We are products of a cover band system. This is part of being human. We train each other to do what we already know. But there comes a time in life when we have to decide whether we will produce original work. If we stay on the cover band career path, we will likely work for someone else, probably in a management role. And the essence of a managers role is to ensure that the companys songs are played. Now, I have trained thousands of managers. I have been a manager. I know the valuable role managers play in a company. So, if we are inclined to spend our careers in corporate management positions, and are not keen on setting out on our own, we can still take our act to another level. Heres how. The best cover bands interpret songs in their own unique way. They put their own spin on the songs they play. They inject their own creativity while still keeping the songs true to the original versions. We can do the same as managers. We can bring our own energy, positive attitude, creative mind, and collaborative approach to everything we do. And then we can achieve, or surpass, the companys goals with our own signature and flair. But the challenge remains, cover bands are not unique. And because their geographical reach is small there are cover bands in every city and town their pay is inherently limited. The market does not reward what is common. Original artists, on the other hand, ultimately have the greatest earning potential. They create their own art. Their work is unique, and the market rewards that which is scarce. Original artists also have the freedom and also the risk to keep creating their own songs. The risk of course is that their work will not be accepted, or worse yet, panned. But the reward is that people will be drawn to their music, bring others along with them and create a demand for even more of the artists work. So, what are your career plans? Will you be a cover band, or an original artist? If creating your own music is your calling, look for ways right now to grow beyond your current cover band work, responsibilities and relationships. Begin by dedicating more time to writing and performing your own music. Spend more time with original artists. And begin freeing yourself of cover band beliefs: Only other peoples work is really good; I am not ready to go out on my own; What if people dont like my work? Then, replace cover band thinking with original artist beliefs: I have a voice I must express; There is an audience for my work; and Im on a mission, and I will not be denied. Your answer to the Cover Band Career Question will determine the direction of your life, whatever your profession. What songs do you want to play?
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10/29/2010 1:53 PM
Lessons from an Unexpected Gratitude Letter I received an email last year. I asked permission to share it with you. I have three reasons for wanting you to know this story. But first, heres the email: David, It was almost five years ago that I first decided to look you up. Allow me to explain the reason behind my decision to contact you after so many years. It will explain how I think you have been helping people for a long time. I have been a police officer in Milwaukee for almost 15 years. I was very good at it, and I felt that I was benefiting society. However, it was an extremely stressful occupation for me because, in spite of my successes, for many of those years I had virtually no skills for managing stress and its effects on my health. Picture this scene: An almost middle-aged, overweight, out of shape, half-asleep cop with a bad attitude is hauling his aching frame from a squad car at 3:00 a.m. into a convenience store for his sugar and caffeine fix to get him through the rest of the shift. A 20 oz. Mountain Dew was the usual fuel of choice for this purpose. For some reason unbeknownst to me, I grabbed chocolate milk that night instead and was instantly reminded of a young David Pollay spooning sugar into a bowl as he explained how much of it we consume in a typical day. Do you remember your speech Sugar: The Hidden Menace? I remember you said there were six to eight teaspoonfuls of sugar in each carton of chocolate milk (Pollay, 1978ish). That incident five years ago in the convenience store was a turning point in my life. It was then that a confluence of three ideas hit me all at once. First, I needed to gain control over my health which was in a sorry state of affairs. By simply heeding the advice of your speech I was able to return to my normal weight. After much struggle, I kicked the soda habit and in so doing I lost the aches and pains. Second, after 10 years on the streets, I realized I needed a different job with a little less stress. I then requested and received a transfer to the Identification Division of the Milwaukee PD. There I was trained as a CSI photographer. Third, I decided to return to college. I am now in my third year working toward a Bachelors Degree in Communication. My kids are also benefiting from your speech because I have a good mental image of how much sugar they are eating on a daily basis. Jakob, 5, and Louis, 3, are my two wonderful boys who are also responsible for motivating me to get off my butt and continue to make the important changes in my life. David, all of this was sparked by a flashback to your speech. It was ahead of its time and delivered in a way that was impossible to forget. I just stored it away and dug it up at a most opportune time. Thank you, David. Andrew Smith Here are my three reasons for telling Andrews story. First, Andrews e-mail was a gift to me. How often do people from our distant past in my case, 30 years ago look us up to tell us that we have made a difference in their lives? Are there people in our lives that we can give a similar gift to this year? Second, Andrews story is inspiring. His life reminds us that we are never stuck on a path without options. We always have a choice. Andrew took the best of his life his meaningful role as a guardian of his community, and a father of two boys and improved it by improving his health, furthering his education and pursuing his mission (Andrew plans to apply his degree to inspirational speaking in the community). Are there things we can improve in our lives this year?
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Third, Andrews e-mail taught me that we do not always know the impact we are having on others. Even if the effects may not be known for many years, it is heartening to think that our roles as parents, friends and colleagues may be having a positive influence on others. We are reminded to give our best to what we care about most our family, our work, our education, our community the results of our efforts could have a long-lasting, positive influence on others. Andrew thanked me for the impact I had on his life. And now, I want to thank Andrew for the impact his letter has had on mine.
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10/29/2010 1:53 PM
Build Your Own Case for Success, and Believe A few months ago I was at a dinner party. A small group of us were standing in the hall when a friend turned to me and said, Hows your book coming? Almost done . . . just editing, I said. Do you have a publisher? One of the New York publishers is reviewing my book proposal and manuscript. Then one of the guests I met that night jumped in. Its tough to publish a book, he said. Talk to John. John was the host of the party and was in the other room. What happened to John? I said. He wrote a great book. I read it. He shook his head and sipped his wine. John had all the connections. He knew all the publishers. He knew all the agents. And he still couldnt get someone to publish his book. Thats too bad, I said. Yeah. Im just telling you because its hard. Thats what Ive heard. Then I asked, Is Johns book still relevant today? Could he still publish it? He said, Oh yeah. Its great. Maybe he could try again, I said. I dont know. The economy is terrible. Yeah, its not good. Just look at the layoffs at the publishing houses, he said. Its not a good time to be coming out with a book. He stopped as if he realized he was not being very encouraging. He flashed a smile and said, Well, I hope it goes well with your book. Good luck. Was this the first time I had heard someone paint this scenario? No. I had heard other versions of the same story line: Its not easy to publish a book. (In fact, its not easy to write a book). More people fail than succeed in the book publishing business. The question is, will I succeed or fail? Does anyone really know? Heres the answer: It could go either way. It depends on what I believe. If I focus on what my new friend was saying, I might convince myself: Book publishing is hard. Look at what happened to John. Even if I know the right agents, publishers, and have a great story, I still might not get the book published. And the economy needs to improve. If it doesnt, publishers wont spend the money on a new book. The odds are against me. Are these beliefs reasonable? Yes. Each one is based in reality. The question is, how often in our lives do we stop there? Someone provides evidence for a belief in conversation, on television or in the newspaper and we accept it. We back away from our dreams and we get realistic. I have a choice to make. Do I accept the assessments of others without challenging them, or do I build my own case for success? If I have any chance of succeeding, I must produce my own evidence to support my belief that my book will not only be published, it will be successful. What about you? Is anyone presenting credible arguments against your dreams? Have people expressed reasonable doubts about your plans? What are you going to do? Will you continue to move ahead, and seek new evidence for your mission? Or will you stop pushing forward to achieve your dreams? What have I decided? I went ahead and built my own evidence. I created my own case for success. Sure, I have my days when doubt creeps in especially after a setback but I quickly realize that a bump in the road does not mean failure. I am committed to success, and I believe it will happen. Think about your life. What are you determined to achieve? Build your own case for success. Believe you will succeed. Then execute your strategy. And if you run into difficulty, adjust your plan and keep going. You can do it. I can do it. Lets make it happen.
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10/29/2010 1:54 PM
The Law of the Host Do you know that feeling you have when you enter a room and you dont know anyone? You know youre supposed to meet new people, but you dont know where to begin. You feel like a little kid on the playground hoping someone will invite you to play. Fourteen years ago, I learned that it doesnt have to be this way. I went to a party in New York City. My friend told me to meet him there. He knew the host. He said it would be fun. He gave me the address. It was in the East Village. I took a cab. My cab pulled up. I paid the driver, got out and walked to the front door. The door was partially open, and I could see people talking and laughing inside. I opened the door wide and stepped in. No one was there to greet me so I unbuttoned my coat. I scanned the room. I couldnt see my friend. I looked at my watch. I was on time. He must be late. I walked in. I looked around the room. I knew no one. The music was loud. People were gathered in small groups. I felt out of place. Just then a young woman with a warm smile approached me. She was holding a big bag of M&Ms. She said, Do you want some M&Ms? Sure, I said, relieved someone was talking to me. OK, open your hand, she said. The young woman poured M&Ms in my hand. Thanks. I put one in my mouth, and cradled my hand around the rest. She said, Welcome to the party. Im Susana. Im David. Nice to meet you. Great apartment. Its a great place, isnt it? Susana said looking around. Then I said, Thanks for having me. Everyone seems to be having fun. She laughed, The party is great. Lots of cool people. But its not my party. Thats funny. I thought this was your party. Susana smiled. No, Im just like you. Before tonight, the only person I knew at the party was my friend who brought me here. Shes over there by the kitchen. I paused. I was confused. She said, I just wanted to welcome you. But what about the big bag of M&Ms and the hello? Susana smiled and looked at me with a question in her eyes. I said, What? Do you really want to know? I do. This is when she told me what I call, The Law of the Host. You can be one of two people in life. You can be a guest, or you can be a host. When you see yourself as a guest, youre always waiting. You wait to be greeted. You wait to be welcomed. You wait to be introduced. Other people come to you. You wait. But when you see yourself as a host, you view life as your event. You reach out to others. You smile. You greet people. You make people feel welcome. And when you do, your life opens up to new people, new experiences, and new opportunities. Susana smiled. Do you want some more M&Ms? No. Im good. Thanks. I looked up and I saw my friend coming across the room. Susana excused herself and said she would be back. It was then I realized Susana was right. I have a choice. Its up to me how I show up in life. My mindset is what matters. If I feel like a guest, I act like a guest. If I feel like a host, I act like a host. We have all played the good host. We feel confident. We feel
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energized. We know it is our responsibility, our pleasure, and our right to interact with everyone. We reach out to people and make them feel comfortable. We make sure they feel included. Its easy for us to live life as a guest. We can let people come to us. This approach is not wrong. Its unobtrusive and it can be respectful. But it is conservative. Its a blending strategy. We avoid the risk of standing out. Stepping out to meet people can lead to disappointment: Not everyone will respond the way we would like or expect. But if we see ourselves as the host, we turn our focus to other people. We welcome them at church, synagogue or our place of worship. We make new connections at our business meetings, conferences, club events and parties we attend. When we follow The Law of the Host, we are at our best and we bring out the best in others. Susana taught me you can play the host wherever you are. Want some M&Ms?
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10/29/2010 1:55 PM
Your 7-Step Life Calling Plan Are we doing as much as we can with the life we have been given? Are we using our natural given talents to a good end? Are we making a difference with our work? Is this what we were meant to do with our lives? Or directly said, Whats the point? Why are we here? These questions have been asked for thousands of years. The way the question is phrased varies, but the meaning is the same. Our quest is universal. Knowing our purpose, or our calling, and living it, increases our happiness. Yale psychology researcher Amy Wrzesniewski and others have also discovered in their research that living our calling leads to superior work performance and career success. Some of us, throughout our lives, have actively sought the answer to the question, What is our calling? We have thought about it for as long as we can remember. Others have pondered this question less often. But, when we experience disruptions in our lives, we all ask the question. Todays global economic crisis is that disruption. It is causing us to reflect. When we lose our jobs, or our salaries are cut or frozen, or our work roles are significantly changed, the question of what we are doing with our lives becomes more urgent. If you are at or near this defining moment, you are looking at one of the most important opportunities of your life. The question then becomes, What do you do next? You can follow my 7-Step LIFE Calling Plan to get started.
1. Write down the things you have frequently dreamed of

doing with your life if given the chance. Write down which of those interests have inspired you the most and would give you the greatest satisfaction if you pursued them.
2. Write down the expenses you must absolutely maintain

in your life, and which ones could be reduced or eliminated. Be creative. You want as much financial room as possible to maneuver into your new, more meaningful, but potentially less lucrative path (at least in the short term).
3. Write down the additional expenses you would likely

incur on your new path. Do you need additional education, training or coaching to pursue your calling?
4. Write down five to 10 of the most successful people in

your domain of interest. Buy their books, listen to their CDs, read their articles, follow their blogs . . . do anything to learn from them.
5. Write down everyone you know who does anything

related to your interest. Write down when you will contact them to learn more about what they do, and what advice they could give you.
6. Pick up your calendar, and choose four days when you

can be alone or with a loved one. Break from your normal routine and environment. You can stay in a hotel, motel, hostel or the home of a friend or family member. Use this time to fully explore what your life would be like if you pursued your dream. How could you make it work? What would you have to do? Take the time to sketch out an ambitious plan. Then make sure to draw out a similarly bold timeline, but infuse it with realism. You must consider the commitments you have, and the ones you will need to modify or give up in order to determine what you can do, when and how quickly.
7. Finally, when you return from your time away, write

down the reasons you are excited that you are pursing your passion. And then, start each day offering thanks for the freedom you have to choose what you do every day. Immerse yourself in the vision of your best possible life. The time to act is now. You are on a mission. You have accepted the challenge of your calling. You will not get there overnight, but you will make it happen. Nineteenth Century British Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli said it best: The secret of success is constancy of purpose.
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10/29/2010 1:55 PM
Your Action = Attraction = Your Next Action = Attraction I have a belief. It guides just about everything I do. Here it is. I will attract what is important to me by taking action. Heres what I mean. Lets start with e-mail. Rather than playing what I call e-mail lottery (checking my e-mail frequently hoping good news awaits me), I open my e-mail with a plan to advance my goals and dreams. Before I check my inbox, I know the people Im going to write, and what I want to say to them. Why? This is when my belief comes into play: If I put in the time and effort, and build the critical relationships to support my mission, I believe I will attract success. And then Ill act again consistent with my objectives, and expect to attract more good things. Heres my formula: My action = attraction = my next action = attraction. Ill give you another example. I make sure to provide valuable products and services worth paying for before I expect checks will arrive in the mail. I negotiate agreements, send out invoices and provide excellent service. And then I believe I will attract payments and client referrals. So, here it is again: My action = attraction = my next action = attraction. Heres a more routine example. When I want a prime parking space, I dont try and will a best spot to appear. I just leave a little early so I can make a lap around the parking lot looking for a choice location. My arriving with a few minutes to spare increases the odds I will be successful, and decreases the chances that I will have to rush around jockeying for a space. Looking for the perfect mate? Take my advice. When I followed it, it worked for me. This was my plan. I respected my health by eating well and exercising. I made sure I had a job I was proud of, and a salary that would provide for me and that special someone. I volunteered for meaningful, non-profit activities that attracted people with similar values. And I told all my friends that I would be happy to meet anyone they thought I should meet. I trusted my friends and accepted their suggestions. I believed that I would at least have an opportunity to spend dinner with someone interesting, and have a chance to try out a new restaurant. I believed then that my action or as I like to say, getting out in circulation would lead to attracting my mate. After meeting a number of great women over the course of a year, I was invited to a friends baby shower (that turned into a party later in the evening). Of course I said, Thanks. Ill be there. Two weeks later it was time for the party. I arrived. I rang the bell. Who answered the door? It was the woman of my life. Thats the night I met Dawn. We began dating that week and have never been apart. Dawn and I married, and we now have two beautiful, loving daughters. The success we enjoy in life ultimately rests on what we think and what we do. We have to believe in ourselves, and we must have a clear vision of our success. But the key to real achievement ultimately comes down to action. Believing in the power of attraction is critical, but it must be matched by a commitment to do what is necessary to achieve our dreams. The storyline of all who have ever achieved greatness in their field involves putting in the effort required. So, if youre a writer, write. If youre a musician, play. If youre a teacher, teach. If youre a sales person, sell. Be in the action that will lead to the success you desire. And then you have every right in fact, it is critical to believe that you will attract success into your life. Use my formula to achieve your best possible life: Your Action = Attraction = Your Next Action = Attraction.
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10/29/2010 1:56 PM
The Power of Your Love Example Have you thought about what your love looks like? Is it warm? Is it kind? Is it accepting? Is it passionate? Is it committed? I learned many years ago that the love we show is the love we teach. They do not love that do not show their love, wrote Shakespeare. Our loved ones learn through our example. Fourteen years ago, just off a rural road in Maine, I saw the power of love. My dad pulled our car to the side of the country road. There were no other cars. The sun was shining. The wind was blowing gently. We stepped out of the car and walked on the gravel toward the cemetery. Mom, Dad and I came to visit the gravesites of my grandparents. Moms parents were buried in the cemetery nestled among small, family farms. Mom and Dad walked hand in hand as we approached the family plot. We were the only ones there. The cemetery was surrounded by an old rock wall hugged by lilac bushes, and framed by maple, pine and oak trees. For over two centuries the graveyard had been the final home of many of our relatives. As we walked slowly on the recently cut grass, I read the names etched into the tombstones I passed. I wondered how many of these people my grandparents had known. We arrived at the foot of my grandparents resting place. My grandmother had passed first, so she was buried in the family plot to the left. Next to her was my grandfather. He passed away 12 years later. And between my grandfathers plot and the gravesite of someone we did not know, there was a small patch of grass. Pointing to it, Mom said, That was for me. Dad and I looked down at the ground. There was just enough room for one more plot. Mom said softly, My parents wanted to make sure that I was near them if I didnt marry. Dad and I looked at Mom. Uncertain, I asked, Do you want to be buried here? Mom hesitated. Theres not a place for your father, she said. I would not want to be without him. I looked at Dad. He was staring straight ahead. Dad put his arm around Mom, and pulled her into him. He kissed her on the top of her head. I will always be with you, he said. He looked at her. If theres only one plot, it will be for you. Theyll just have to lay my ashes around you. I couldnt speak. Dad held Mom in his arms. I looked down at the open spot of grass. Mom and Dad reached out to me. We quietly embraced. Emily Dickinson reminds us, Unable are the Loved ones to die / For Love is Immortality. The example of my parents love will be with me always. In his book, Spiritual Evolution, Harvard research psychiatrist George Vaillant, wrote: Love, like the sacred and our image of God, has a timeless quality. That day, just off that rural road in Maine, I saw true love. I saw how much my parents loved each other. Every day we have an opportunity to demonstrate our love to the most important people in our lives. So, what is your love example?
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10/29/2010 1:56 PM
To Partner or Not to Partner in Business? In last weeks column, I suggested that if youre faced with finding a job in todays challenging economy, now may be the time to explore opening your own business. The question that some of you will ask is whether you should take on a partner to do it. I learned just how important that question was when I became an entrepreneur at seven years old. My business was selling knick-knacks for pennies to the kids who rode the bus with me on the way to school. It was an instant success. Everyone wanted to buy something. The challenge was that early on the demand for my products nearly outstripped my supply. I needed help. A joint venture After one week on my own, Simon, a kid in my class, had an idea. He came back to my seat on the bus to discuss it. David, I have stuff too. He reached into his backpack and pulled out a plastic bag full of knick-knacks. We could put our things together and sell them to everyone. Simons bag would solve my supply problem. So, we shook hands and became partners. The first week we made $2.92. With Simons help we more than doubled the revenue I had brought in the week before. The next week we did just as well. And each day we added the money we made to the cigar box I carried in my backpack. But then, the following Monday, Simon did something that changed our business. We had just returned to our classroom from lunch. We were settling in to our desks with the rest of the kids. The teacher had not yet arrived. Come see our stuff, Simon announced to the class. David and I have a little store. The kids immediately swarmed around me. I called out to Simon, This is not a good idea! Simon yelled back, Were fine. Well stop before the teacher comes back. The kids went into a buying frenzy. Everyone wanted something. Simon was beside himself. He kept passing our things around, getting the kids even more excited to buy. I was nervous. I didnt have a good feeling about what was happening. We were attracting too much attention. Simon, I said. We have to stop! Simon couldnt hear me. Then I saw our teacher enter the classroom. I knew this was bad news. Our teacher was plain mean. She would make fun of anyone who made mistakes in her classroom. You never wanted to be on her bad side. And we were about to be on her bad side. Meanwhile, one of the girls in our class had set her sights on a postcard we were selling for five cents. But she didnt have any money. Luckily her mom was at school. She asked her. Unfortunately for us, her mom was our teacher. When her mom learned what was going on, she started scanning the room like a prison spotlight looking for an escaped convict. She stopped looking when she found me. Her stare gave me an instant stomach ache. Stop! Everyone sit down! our teacher yelled. Now! Keeping her eyes fixed on me, she said: David, I understand you have things to sell. I couldnt talk. I was so nervous. I just wanted to go home. Everyone was staring at me. I was bright red. My teacher continued, David, Im so pleased to tell everyone what youre going to do today with all of your money, she said. Come up here please and bring your money. I picked up my cigar box and slowly walked to the front of the room with my head down. David, look up, she said as I arrived. I want you to show everyone how much you made for charity. She took a clear vase from her desk, put it in front of me, and said, Pour. I didnt move. She raised her voice, Pour! And, in an instant, my business
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She raised her voice, Pour! And, in an instant, my business was over. Here are the three lessons I learned that day: 1) Choose your business partner wisely, if you need one at all; 2) Know and follow the rules of the business youre in; and 3) Be grateful that you live in a free society where the government cannot shut you down without due process. I remembered these lessons when I opened my second business in 2002, The Momentum Project. This time around I decided to run my own business. What are your plans?
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10/29/2010 1:59 PM
Happy Birthday Big Lou, and Thanks Dad turns 79 this week. He is as strong of mind and body as ever. Dad still does whatever he can to take care of his family. He always has. In honor of his birthday, heres an example. I was 13. I had just eaten a ton of pizza with a couple friends at the local pizza place in Milwaukee. I was stuffed. We ate there at least once a week. We were walking toward the exit when a kid barreled into me. It was the always in trouble little brother of a girl I knew. What are you doing, Franky? I asked. Franky started punching me in the stomach. Franky, what are you doing? I asked. I just ate. Why are you hitting me? I stepped back. Franky stepped forward and kept punching. Enough, Franky! I said as I moved him back this time. Stop doing that. I turned to go. And then boom! I went flying into the kitchen. Someone had shoved me hard from the side. I landed a step away from the pizza guy. I turned to see who pushed me. It was Frankys juvenile delinquent cousin. He was 16. He started yelling, Why are you picking on someone younger than you are? I said, What are you talking about? Then I remembered Franky had been sitting in a booth near the door with his trouble-maker cousin and another bad news kid. I realized I had been set up. Now, I didnt want any trouble. I knew this guy was bad news. So, I turned to my friends who had been quiet the whole time and said, Lets get out of here. They followed. And so did the tough guy. He stopped at the door and yelled out, If you come back here, he said, pointing to the ground, your ass is grass. I was a football player, and I could defend myself. But I had nothing to prove. I just wanted to hang out at my favorite place. So did my friends. Only now this older kid wanted to keep us out. Mom and Dad were at home when I arrived. I didnt want to talk about what had happened. I would just say hi and forget about it. Mom and Dad were in the kitchen. Whats wrong? Mom said as I entered the room. One-point-two seconds and my cover was already blown. Nothing Mom. Im fine. Dad said, Whats going on? Nothing, Im OK. No youre not. Something happened, and you need tell us. So I gave in and told my parents everything. David, get your coat, Dad said. Dad, we cant do that, I said. That wont be good. I didnt want Dad involved. I was afraid people would think I needed my dad to protect me. Dad stopped and looked at me. How old is this guy? Sixteen. And how old are you? Thirteen. Son, get your coat. We got in the van and drove back to the place. Dad pulled up in front. Is he still there? I looked out my window, Yeah. Which guy? Dad said.
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The guy with the short hair by the window next to the exit. OK. Stay in the van. I watched Dad get out and walk to the door. My dad was 63 and strong. Everyone called him Big Lou. I saw him through the restaurant windows. He went right to the table. Dad pointed at Frankys cousin, and gestured for him to get up. The guy didnt move. Dad then pointed again with his arm straight out. Still the guy didnt move. Then Dad turned around, walked out and got back into the van. What did you say? I asked Dad. I said, I understand youre looking for a fight. And you like going after kids younger than you are. I guess youre the big man. OK, big man. Get up. This must have been the part when Dad was motioning for the kid to stand up. Dad continued, Get up. Lets go. What did he say? I said. Nothing. Then what? I said, My kid likes this place. Hell be back. If you mess with him, Ill be back. The next week I went back with my friends. The kid was there. But he didnt say anything. Neither did my friends. It was as though we had an agreement to forget about it. I guess everyone knew my dad. You dont mess with Big Lou.
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Check Your Happiness Label First It was my first night in New York City. I was on vacation. I stepped in line at the caf. I was set on something really sweet for dessert something special, a sort of celebration of being back in the city. The line in the caf conveniently passed the display case of desserts. I read the names on the little cards placed in front of each dessert: Four Layer Cream Cheese Cake, Iced Lemon Pound Cake, Godiva Chocolate Cheesecake and Chocolate Pecan Pie. They all looked delicious. Then I noticed that there were little numbers below the names. I couldnt make them out, so I put on my glasses. Ahh . . . the little numbers were the calorie counts. That was a first for me. I had never chosen a dessert in a restaurant with that information available. Up to that point in the caf line, I had been leaning toward the Godiva Chocolate Cheesecake. Then I read the calorie count: 1,050 calories! That equaled more than four of my favorite chocolate bars. No way. That was too much. I wanted something sweet, but I didnt need all that. As I approached the register, I saw a big chocolate pretzel rod. I looked at the calorie count: 100 calories. Sold. Even better, the pretzel was 70 percent less expensive. The next day I was in line for dessert again dessert is part of any vacation DNA but this time I was in a different caf. I saw those signs again. This time I was eyeing the Double Dipped Chocolate Molten Cake: 879 calories. Yikes! Then I eyed a big marshmallow Rice Krispie treat. I loved those as a kid. Mom used to make them for us. Easy decision: 220 calories. I ordered it, ate it and loved it. And I was happy I didnt have to waste all my calories on one dessert. On my way out of the restaurant I said to the cashier, I love the calorie labels. Is that common in New York? Its everywhere. Its actually the law in the city, he said. Really? I asked. Yup, we have to put the calorie counts on every food item we serve, he said. What an excellent idea, I thought to myself. We could make an informed decision every time we purchased a meal. How great is that? I could quickly take into account in just a few seconds how good it would be for me, how much energy it would give me and how my pants would fit the next day. The calorie labeling, I thought, was brilliant. And then it hit me: What if we had information like that when we made other choices in our lives? What if we knew what choices would make us happiest? Should I sit and watch television, or should I read a chapter on the subject Im studying? Should I check e-mail again, or spend time with my family? Should I surf the Internet, or write a thank you note to someone? Like choosing the right dessert, we want to choose well when deciding what to do with our time. Thats why I created the idea of Happiness Labeling. We all need help quickly assessing the options we have in life. Too often we make decisions without considering the full context of our concerns. We need an efficient sorting tool to guide us our own happiness labels. So, this week, think about what should be on your happiness labels. What should you consider when deciding what to do with your time? What will you find meaningful, enjoyable and worth doing? What will make you happier and more successful? We, of course, dont always make the best choices even when educated to the consequences of our decisions. We may look at our happiness labels, and still choose the one with the least nutritional value. Sometimes we just feel like indulging ourselves. Fine. We all have our moments. But, lets spend most of our time looking at our happiness labels, make the best choices and enjoy our increased happiness and success as a result. Now, what are you having for dessert?
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10/29/2010 2:01 PM
Your Success and Rocket Science If we watch commercials on television, listen to promotions on the radio, flip through magazine ads and read marketing e-mails, we are constantly told that were missing out. We could be making lots of money by working only a few hours a week, buying special products or taking a weekend seminar. Were told our path to greatness and having everything we want in life can be had almost overnight. We know in our hearts that success is not achieved this way. Success takes time. When we get away from all the marketing hype, we realize that sustained success comes to those who love what they do, feel that their work matters and are committed to becoming experts in their field. During good times and bad times we should invest in what is meaningful and long-lasting. Stephen King has sold more than 300 million books. One of his books, On Writing, is a book about the craft of writing and his journey as a writer. His success is not a get-rich-quick story. King wrote, By the time I was fourteen (and shaving twice a week whether I needed to or not) the nail in my wall would no longer support the weight of the rejection slips impaled upon it. I replaced the nail with a spike and went on writing. The next time youre being seduced by a short-cut to success message, think of Stephen Kings journey to 300 million books. Rocket science and your plans When we give up believing theres an overnight path to success, were faced with the reality that achieving our dreams will require significant effort. And if were just getting started, things can look complicated theres so much to learn and do. This was the challenge I experienced when I decided to form my own publishing business. Im a newspaper columnist and speaker I know very little about book publishing, printing, distribution, promotion, logistics, sales and fulfillment. Everything I needed to do felt overwhelming. (And if you read the news, book publishing is a business in peril.) And then, I got lucky. I had longstanding plans to take my family to NASAs Kennedy Space Center, and the trip helped me put everything back in perspective. We took every tour and we visited every exhibit. We walked inside a retired space shuttle. We watched the assembly of components for the International Space Station. We saw one of the original rockets that took astronauts to the moon. We took a picture of the lunar rover. On one of the tours I learned that it took over 400,000 people working together to get the first astronauts to the moon. 400,000 people! Thats a lot of rocket scientists. When I heard that, I immediately thought of my publishing effort. It just wasnt that complicated after all. It would require a lot of work, but I could do it. I could succeed on my mission without requiring rocket scientists. Ask yourself if your plan requires rocket scientists. Our perspective Life is full of challenges, especially during this down economy. But, more than ever we must keep our perspective. We must focus on what matters. Maybe its time for us to have the persistence of Stephen King, and the inspiration of NASAs rocket scientists.
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10/29/2010 2:02 PM
The Bad Driver and the Kind Woman Two days ago, Mom parked her car in a bookstore parking lot. She locked her car and walked inside. Mom bought a book, went to the caf and enjoyed a light lunch. After reading for an hour, Mom walked back to her car. When she arrived at her parking space, there was a red car parked so close to Moms that only Flat Stanley could have squeezed in the gap. She stood there in disbelief. Mom looked back at the store. She hoped she would see the owner returning to the car. No one appeared. The only way for Mom to get into the drivers seat was through the passenger side front door. She would have to step across the gear shift, and under the steering wheel to get into her seat. Moms 76. She looks great. Her health is good, but her hips, knees and back are not best deployed for flexibility maneuvers. Mom walked around her car and opened the front passenger door. She moved two packages to the back seat, and removed the water bottle from the drink holder. As Mom was doing this, an SUV pulled up in the space in front of her. The driver of the SUV, a woman probably in her 40s, saw the predicament Mom was in. She caught Moms eye, raised her hands in disbelief and made the sympathetic face of can you believe that other car? Mom smiled, shrugged her shoulders and started making her way into the car. Just then the woman in the SUV called over, Would you like me to help you? Really? Mom said. Sure. Ill back the car out for you, said the woman. Mom knew it wouldnt be easy climbing into the seat, and it would be a challenge backing out without scraping the other car. Mom said, Oh, that would be wonderful. Thank you so much. The woman stepped in Moms car, slid over into the drivers seat, started the car and carefully backed out. She straightened out the car in the parking aisle and got out. Thank you so much! Mom said to the woman. My pleasure. That was a tight squeeze. Glad I could help. Mom was so grateful she hugged the woman. As she did, a teenage girl walked up. Looking at the girl, Mom asked, Is this your mother? The girl inched closer to the woman and nodded, Yes. Well, your mother is a wonderful woman, Mom said. The girl looked at her mother and smiled. The three waved to each other. The mother and daughter went into the bookstore. Mom got into her car and drove away. This story reminds me to focus on whats important in life. Some might be inclined to spend time focusing on the driver who pinned Mom in. They might say: What a bad driver! There are so many terrible drivers these days. People just dont care anymore. The question to consider is how would this line of thinking help us or anyone with whom we share this story. If you know my Law of the Garbage Truck, youll know where we should put our attention: We should let the negative things we cannot control like the poor parking job of another driver pass us by. That way we are free to focus on the good a kind woman who came to Moms aid, Moms expression of gratitude and a girl witnessing her mothers kindness. Someones bad parking job is not the important part of this story. Its just the set-up for the good that came next. Thats the part of the story worth telling. And thats how Mom told it to me.
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10/29/2010 2:02 PM
My First Day at Yahoo! Recently I gave a speech to a few hundred people. The crowd was great. I told them about The Law of the Garbage Truck and they took The No Garbage Trucks! Pledge with me. They participated in everything. Following my speech, the event sponsor asked me to stay for some questions. It was my pleasure; I answered whatever they asked. I think it was the third question when someone asked me, What was it like working for Yahoo! in the early days? The event sponsor, who had talked about my time at Yahoo! during my introduction, immediately asked the audience, How many of you would like to hear about Davids experience at Yahoo!? The answer surprised me. They all raised their hands. Heres the quick story I told the audience. Its about my first day at Yahoo!. Day One It was 1998. I was Yahoo!s first director of Customer Care, and employee number 450. My first day on the job started with new-hire orientation. There were eight of us in the room. We talked about what brought us to Yahoo!, and why we were excited to be there. We listened to a company overview. Our benefits were explained. We filled out paperwork. We received our official badges. Then each one of us was escorted to our cubicles. My Tour My escort was great. On the way to my cube, she gave me a narrated tour of the building, pointing out everything along the way. Heres the kitchen, she said. Oh, and heres the new-employee bulletin board. Your picture will be here later today. We kept moving and looking around. Heres the life-sized Elvis statue. Theres the Luke Skywalker cutout; its always showing up in different peoples offices. And here are our cool chairs and sofas. The furniture was always dressed in Yahoo!s internal colors, purple and yellow. The Cubes Just beyond the furniture were rows and rows of cubes. We called it the cube farm. We headed into it and turned toward the back corner of the building. Theres Tim Koogles cube, she continued her tour. You know hes the president and CEO. Everyone called him T.K. His cube was in the corner. I thought it was great that he worked in a cubicle just like all the other Yahoos (the name for all of us inside the company). We turned right and walked down the line of window cubes. Theres Jerrys cube. Its a little messy. He gets away with it. Hes creative. Jerry Yang, along with David Filo, had founded the company a few years earlier. We kept walking. Theres Jeffs cube. You met Jeff when you flew in for your day of interviews. Jeff Mallett was our chief operating officer, soon to be promoted to president. Jeff would also be my boss a few months later. Heres Garys cube. Gary was in his office, on the telephone and waved. Gary Valenzuela was our chief financial officer. We continued. Five steps later, we stopped again. My guide looked at me. Heres your cube. At that moment, I had an out-of-body experience. I thought to myself, Is my name really on the big gold star outside this cube? (The custom at Yahoo! was to use gold stars instead of name plates.) I know my role is important. Im here to build Customer Care. But they have me sitting next to the CFO, whos next to the COO, whos next to the co-founder, whos next to the CEO. This has to be a mistake. It wasnt. At Yahoo! every role and every department were equally valuable. We all had cubes and we sat where there was a) space available (we were growing fast) and b) wherever it helped us best coordinate our work. A Chance to Contribute My five years at Yahoo!, first as senior director of Customer
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My five years at Yahoo!, first as senior director of Customer Care and then as director of Learning and Development, reinforced my belief that the best companies focus on collaboration, keep politics to a minimum and continually deliver outstanding products and services to their customers. Yahoo! had its challenges in the early days, and we all made mistakes plenty of them but they didnt get in the way of ultimately offering us a chance to provide our customers with the best products and services possible. I think this is what were all looking for in our companies. And thats what I told the audience that day.
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10/29/2010 2:03 PM
The Five Fs of Customer Care Do you know the values of your organization? Can you articulate them? Are they memorable? When I joined Yahoo! in 1998 as Yahoo!s first director of Customer Care, I realized the importance of being able to answer yes to these three questions. Why? The values we hold drive the decisions we make. Yahoo! had 50 million customers when I started. Thousands more were joining every day. We were launching new products, services and features every week. Yet we had only a handful of employees dedicated to customer service and almost no customer support infrastructure. We had a lot to do in a short period of time. The question was where to begin. For us it began with deciding what was most important to us: What were our values? If we could be clear on what we stood for, all the required staffing, training, technology and service program decisions would be made easier. Our strategies and tactics would be grounded in the type of organization we were committed to building. So we launched The Five Fs of Customer Care. As you can guess, the Five Fs were five words that all started with the letter F. We wanted them to be memorable. We wanted everyone to know them. Here they are: Friendly, Fast, Focused, Fired-Up and Fun! Our Five F message was always the same: 1) We were friendly to our customers, to each other, and to everyone else at Yahoo!. People wanted to work with us. 2) We were fast at resolving customer problems and internal issues. Our team was quick, and so was our email and phone support technology. 3) We were focused on our priorities. Our goals, plans and reports kept us on track. (4) We were fired up. We had plenty of energy to give our best every day. Wed work all night if we needed to meet a challenge. (5) We were fun! People enjoyed working with us. We worked and played together. We had a recreation team to plan team events. We kept our work environment enjoyable. And then we had our Bonus F: Flexible. We made sure everyone knew that we were capable of responding to whatever Yahoo! needed us to do. We welcomed the opportunity to support new products and services. Huston Smith, author of The Religions of Man, discusses the challenge of developing a deliberate tradition of values in any society. A people must first decide what values are important to their collective well-being, wrote Smith. Then every device of education, formal and informal, should be turned to seeing that these values are internalized as far as possible by everyone. Everyone we interviewed learned The Five Fs. Every time we gave a tour, we explained The Five Fs. When we spoke during Yahoo!s new-hire orientation program, we presented The Five Fs. Bill George, former CEO of Medtronic, talks about the importance of having clearly understood values in an organization. In his book, Authentic Leadership, George wrote: Values have to be discussed at every opportunity, constantly reinforced and consistently reflected in the actions of management at all levels. Our Five Fs were a guide for what we said and did. Of course there were plenty of days when we did not meet our own expectations, but our focus on our Five F values made sure our backsliding didnt last long. Our Five Fs were our identity. We were committed to living them. How about your organization? What values are driving your business?
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10/29/2010 2:04 PM
Act on Your Next Gratitude Impulse My younger daughter, Ariela, graduated from pre-kindergarten last week. The ceremony was wonderful. Ariela and all the kids were adorable. Arielas cap was a white felt cut-out with a gold tassel and her gown was one of my white dress shirts worn backwards. We took pictures. We clapped. We laughed. We yelled, Ariela! Yay, Ariela! She waved. She smiled. It was a beautiful evening. When we came home, Dawn and the girls went to sleep. I started working again. Id been back at my desk writing for about an hour when it hit me. I became overwhelmed with gratitude. I stopped what I was doing. I leaned back. I closed my eyes. I knew my daughters graduation my daughters life would not have been possible without my wife, Dawn. Dawn gave birth to our daughters and cares for them every day. She is a wonderful mother. I felt grateful. Has this ever happened to you? You were in the middle of doing something when all of a sudden you felt thankful for someone important in your life? You may have been working, reading, exercising, meditating or praying. And without warning you became overwhelmed by a feeling of gratitude. I believe we all have felt this way at some point in time. In fact, I believe most of us have experienced this feeling many times. I call these moments of clarity gratitude impulses. These experiences remind us whats important in our lives. But like all emotions, gratitude impulses can be fleeting. We feel the initial emotion. We pause. We reflect. But then we catch ourselves. We wake up. We get back to what we were doing. We move on. I suggest another way. Act on your gratitude impulses. Dont let them pass by. Gratitude impulses are authentic expressions of who we are and what matters to us. They reflect our unguarded selves. They remind us of the important people in our lives. They call our attention to what we care about. In these moments we dont feel self-conscious. We dont evaluate our feelings. We just feel grateful. This is the time for us to act. When we feel grateful to people, we should let them know. We should call them, text them, instant-message them or write them. And we can make it quick: We just need to let them know how we feel. We should express our gratitude before we start rationalizing why now is not the time. Sure, we can think about the best way to express our appreciation, but we should not let our thoughtful deliberation lead to inaction. Even in the workplace, we should act on our gratitude impulses. When we genuinely feel grateful to others at work, we should express it. Let people know. Tell them why. Be specific. Research tells us that we all value being told how much we matter. One day we may not be able to reach the people we love and care about. Why let our gratitude impulses go unexpressed? We can embrace our feelings of gratitude each time they come. Lets act on our next gratitude impulse. Why wait?
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10/29/2010 2:04 PM
The Rule of the Test Drive Twelve years ago I learned a powerful lesson in an automobile showroom. For years, Id had my eyes on one car. It was a convertible. The shape of the body was unique. The soft top looked great. I liked the body painted red. I liked the top in black fabric. I had never been in the car, but I loved the way it looked. In 1997, I moved from New York to Atlanta. I needed a car. Why not get the car I like so much? I thought. So I did research. An Atlanta dealership had just the one I wanted. Dawn my girlfriend at the time, now my wife of 10 years came with me. We arrived at the lot. I saw the car. I loved it. A salesman came out to meet us. We sat down at the salesmans desk. We talked about the car how unique and attractive it was. Then I started negotiating. We talked about the sale price, financing and warranties. We talked a lot. The salesman stepped away to get some more information. Dawn watched the salesman until he was out of hearing range. She leaned into me and said, Why dont you take the car for a test drive? I laughed. Why hadnt I thought of that? I was so caught up in talking about the car; I had forgotten the most important thing how the car drives. The salesman returned. Can we take the car for a test drive? I said. Sure, let me get the keys, he said. I was excited. I was about to drive my dream car. We went out to the lot. I opened the door and slipped into the drivers seat. Dawn rode up front with me, the salesman climbed in back. I turned on the car. The motor was louder than Id expected. I drove out of the parking lot. I put my foot on the accelerator to merge onto the busy street. The pickup was slower than Id expected. We turned onto the highway. The car was not as comfortable as Id expected. We returned to the lot. Dawn and I got out of the car and stepped to the side. What did you think? Dawn said. The car is beautiful, but it doesnt drive or feel like I thought it would, I said. What are you going to do? Im not going to buy it. It still looks great, but its not the car I want to drive every day. All those years of admiration and all that talk in the showroom, and it took only a 10-minute test drive to make me see that the car was not for me. Havent we all experienced this at some point in time? Weve dreamed about something for years, only to realize were still sitting in the showroom. All we really need is a good test drive. Many of us experience this with our careers. We say, Thats what Id really like to do in my life, or we say, If I were doing that, I would be so happy. Then we look at what were currently doing and we see that were not spending any time exploring our dreams. Were stuck in the showroom thinking about what we want, thinking about what we would enjoy and thinking about what we would be good at doing. This is when we must follow the rule of the test drive. If something interests you, get out of the showroom. Take your interest for a test drive. The rule of the test drive helps us get away from the ifs. If we were given the opportunity. If we were discovered. If we had more luck. If we had less responsibility at work or home. If we had more time, money, or support. If only we didnt have these constraints, wed pursue the lives we want to lead. The key is to get ourselves out of the showroom and take a test drive. When we do, we quickly find out one of three things. 1) We like what we explore and do more of it. 2) We dont like it and we put our energy somewhere else. 3) Were not sure if we like it; we need to give it another try. Whatever the result, were at least exploring our interests. We move
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the result, were at least exploring our interests. We move ourselves closer to living our best possible lives. How about you? What are the interests youre talking about? What are you going to test drive this week?
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10/29/2010 2:05 PM
7 Reasons for Positive Updates The most common way of getting people to share ideas is to hold a meeting. Weve all attended hundreds, if not thousands, of meetings. But heres the problem. Let me demonstrate it. Pretend the following statement applies to you right now. You have to go to a meeting. Okay. How are you feeling? What are you thinking? If youre like most people, youre not happy. You might have said to yourself, Oh no. I just want to get my work done. or Why do I have to sit in another meeting? or This is going to be a waste of time. If this is how you feel, how do you think other people feel? This is what youre up against when you ask people to come to your meeting. Most people come to meetings in the mood of the last call they had, e-mail they read, meeting they attended or interaction they had with someone. Their moods and attention are basically tied up in other things. The key is to get everyone focused on the expected outcomes of your meeting. So you have to do something different. Ill share with you what Ive been doing for years with my team meetings. It will not cure peoples fear or dread of meetings, but it will help you get your meetings off to a good start every time. Begin your meetings with what I call positive updates. Heres how to do it. If the group is eight or less (Ill talk about big groups in another column), ask them all to share one positive or important thing that happened to them since the last time you met. (I include important because it leaves open the possibility for someone to mention an event that might not be categorized as positive, but is obviously important to them.) It can be personal or professional. It can be something theyre excited about, proud of or interested in. Tell them they have 30 seconds to give their update. Then go around the room sharing positive updates. Encourage quick reactions from everyone in the group, but ask that extended responses be shared after the meeting. Why should you open your meetings with this strategy? Here are my seven reasons for positive updates:
1. You are channeling your team members attention. You

are engaging them with your request.
2. You are reminding them to keep track of whats good in

their lives, not just whats wrong.
3. You are helping them access their positive emotions.

When they recall something good that happened in their lives, they are likely to feel pride, excitement, gratitude, enthusiasm, encouragement or optimism. The research of Barbara Fredrickson, Ph.D., at the University of North Carolina demonstrates how experiencing positive emotions is critical for success in business and life. You are learning about your team members. You are opening a window into what matters to them and what makes them unique. What do they focus on? What makes them happy? When do they succeed? You get insight into what they like to do and what theyre good at doing. You can look for more opportunities for them to do what they do well. Youll know how to better recognize your people. Youll find out what matters to them in their short updates. Rather than giving them some formulaic recognition award, you can tailor your gratitude to their interests. Youll give your team members the opportunity to learn more about each other. Youll provide the opening for teammates to talk about each others interests and what matters to them.
4.
5. 6.
7.
All of this happens in 10 minutes or less. The great thing is that you dont have to come up with a big entertaining way to start every meeting. Just ask people to tell each other something positive or important. Theyll share. Team members will listen. Everyone will be engaged. Still thinking if you should do this? Stop for a second. Write down one positive thing that happened to you over the past week. Take a minute and think of one. Do it now. Write it down. Then e-mail me what you wrote. Ill bet you feel pretty good right now. You might even be ready for a meeting.
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