Potpourri 1710A

BELIEVE IN YOURSELF

What does it take for you to believe in yourself?  Something as simple as looking in the mirror?  Or something more?  How about accomplishments?  There’s nothing like “proving yourself” to make believing a positive reality.  Pick a reachable objective or goal and go make it happen.  Then pick an impossible one and go for it.  The collateral benefits will be awesome, even if you don’t make it all the way on the first shot.  Keep shooting!

ACCEPT CHALLENGE, RESPONSIBILITY WITH AUTHORITY

Most of our poorest choices are made simply to avoid challenge or responsibility … woe is us for being so sorely put upon by life that we need to be constantly pampered and protected from life’s vicissitudes!  However, while such choices soften the hard edges of life in the moment, a virtual “soft edge” is a poor defense against real vicissitudes whose edges only get harder with inattention. 

Dylan Thomas, writing about the ultimate challenge, death, said: “Rage against the dying of the light!”  In facing everyday challenges, we sometimes have to use generative “rage” simply to keep the lights of life burning.  Avoidance of challenge or responsibility doesn’t keep the lights on.  Acceptance and dispatch of challenge and responsibility keeps the lights on.  Claim the authority to do so for your own wellbeing, and make it happen.

INCLINATION

People say ATTITUDE makes the biggest difference in our success/fulfillment/ well-being.  However, I think the factor referred to as “Attitude” may better be called INCLINATION.  “As a tree is inclined, so it grows.”  (Attribution Unknown)  If I am inclined to DO good rather than inclined to EXPECT good to be done to me, my outlook on life – my ATTITUDE – will be much more reinforced and rewarded.  If I am inclined to mischief, mayhem and drama, my life, in consequence, will be ceaseless dissonance and I will meet resistance rather than resonance at every turn.   

DO SOMETHING

Life is a journey we must initiate, plod along, learn as we go, and fly as we can.  It’s not a guided tour or parking lot.  Today, do something or go somewhere you haven’t been before. Instead of watching television, exercise, or go visit someone who needs a kind word.  Get organized.  Build something.  Educate yourself or sign up for classes.  Join Toastmasters or a community service organization.  Buy some new software and learn how to use it.  Plant seeds of promise.  Invest in yourself and your future.  Invest in a better world.

WHAT’S HOLDING YOU BACK?  (Kent Howell, Business Lexington, 1/08/2010)

Sobering data:  57%::61%::58% are the percentages of salespeople who made their sales quotas in 2006, 2007 and 2008, respectively.  What happened to the other 40%?  Subtract out unrealistic goals, family and health problems and the economy and you’ve still got some explaining to do.  Of course, procrastination remains alive and well.  Some didn’t really take the quotas seriously; a lot of golf was still being played and television watched.  And some didn’t believe they really “needed” to hustle all that much.  Some used outmoded sales techniques and neither understood nor cared about “Continuous Quality Improvement”.  60% met their quotas.  Some of them have viable excuses for not exceeding them. 

What’s your excuse or explanation for not meeting your goals? 

MAKING LIFE EASY

Life is tough!  But only because we’re not.  If we become tougher than life, life will become easy. 

The good news is that once you overcome the tyranny of trivial pursuits, the despotism of distractions, the autocracy of unfounded assumptions, and exploitation by unrealistic expectations, life is a piece of cake.  

How many of us don’t get enough sleep? 

How many of us would prosper with just ONE extra hour of sleep a night?

How many of us watch more than one hour of TV per day?

Is something beginning to register here?

How many of us could use two hours of valet service each day?

How many of us watch more than two hours of TV per day?

 … or spend at least that much time kibitzing on social media?

Is becoming your own valet for two hours a day beneath your dignity?

EASIER

It’s been said “If it were easy, everybody would be doing it!”  Or not!!  It is more accurate to say “If it were easy, everybody COULD do it.”  But they won’t.  Some will go to inordinate lengths to find something EVEN EASIER.  Many aren’t truly satisfied unless doing absolutely nothing; others unless creating Sturm and Drang; more than a select few will make it all harder than it needs to be; and many of the rest don’t understand or appreciate how easy purposeful and productive engagement really CAN be – if they would only start early and detach themselves from all the baggage and bondage of fool’s gold founderings and fetishes. 

Unfortunately – or perhaps fortunately (!) – “Easier” tends to become boring, frustrating, disappointing, depressing, full of regret, and anything other than “enlifening”.  We can make a BETTER life easier – at least more sustainable – by raising the stakes and pounding them more firmly in the ground.  Just DOIT!  Quartermaster

Hopeless & Helpless

Lamenting the “State of the Workforce in 2016”, I shared with our Business Owners’ Advisory Board (BOAB) my feedback from the state Workforce Development (WFD) Office, which indicated that the main problem in WFD is finding prospects with ANY INCLINATION AT ALL to BE “Developed”. 

An astute member of the group said she is not only acutely aware of the problem but senses a feeling of HOPELESSNESS on the part of many non-aspiring prospects who seem to have given up. 

A moment’s sobering reflection suggested this may be a core problem, and multiple factors may contribute to such a condition.  Potential contributing factors include:

1.    Economic Conditions: There has been a tsunami of economic change from a manufacturing economy in the US to an automated workplace with a proliferation of low-wage service jobs.  And “middle management” – long the mainstay of middle-income America – has disappeared with the flattening of corporate organizational structures.

2.    Foreign Competition: Due to highly skilled, cheap labor in developing countries, the US no longer represents the “gold standard” in either quality of goods or value of goods.

3.    Homefront Competition has Increased: 

a.    Even traditional “Professional” occupations are now saturated with certified “Professionals”.  

b.    At the bottom and middle, immigrants to the US work harder for less pay and are content to live in associated sub-standard conditions with an undying hope – which they see as promise – that they will eventually rise to the higher standards they see around them.  Many DO!  Then they are both doubly rewarded and doubly resented for it!

c.    Upper-middle and advanced professional careers are increasingly being filled by foreign nationals.  [In Science, Technology, Engineering, Math and Medicine, it is extremely rare to find natural-born US citizens either willing or able to shoulder the load of preparation in these disciplines.]   THAT’S DEPRESSING!

4.    “Fluffy” Career Visioning:  “Hard Sciences” are to be avoided like the plague!

a.    STEM careers are for NERDS.

b.    “New Age Mainstreaming” includes college degrees in:  Professional Nanny, Personal/Private Chef, Tourism & Event Management, Culinary Arts, Hotel and Restaurant Mgt., Marketing & Sales, Communications, Logistics & Transportation

c.    It’s too easy to convince oneself that all you need is a guitar, a mega-amplifier and a screaming voice to “make it” BIG TIME in the entertainment industry.

d.    When the economy goes south, guess which occupations dry up the fastest?

5.    Unrealistic Expectations: Even a college education does not automatically open doors of opportunity to “having it all”.

6.    Fantasy:  Super Heroes, Knights in Shining Armor, Fairy Godmothers and deus ex machina rescues do not exist in the real world.

7.    Too Many Choices:  Where would you start in choosing a 21^st century career?

8.    Safety Nets:  Living at home is no longer an unattractive option as an ultimate “fall-back” position.  Thus, a do-or-die /\ failure is impossible/unacceptable mentality no longer applies; hopelessness and helplessness is not only easier but often enabled (see #11).

9.    Cocooning:  Life in Syria is hopeless.  Those who can’t or won’t leave are, indeed, both hopeless and helpless.  Emigrants, though facing threat of death, have at least half a chance … and are getting critically needed assistance from benevolent countries. 

10.  Discordance:  Sharks can’t mate with zebras and Cellular One adaptors won’t power up iPhones – even if you can buy them in the same store!  THAT’S hopelessness!!  Start low (with “common denominators” where opportunities mesh with skills) and GROW!  (Need a suggestion?  Start at the bottom in fast food and see how quickly you can work your way UP to manager … perhaps even to owner!  They even provide training!)    

11.  Soft Consequences and Delayed Ramification:  Along with expansion of the concepts of equal opportunity and self-determination has come an increased risk of flagrant failure.  Expectations have been lowered, primary and secondary education grades have been inflated, and the “village” has become diffused to a point that nobody is accountable.  It’s getting easier to circumvent the system – up until the system won’t take it … and then it’s often too late.  Faced with escalating boundary breaches, parents will say “Wait ‘til you get to high school!”, teachers will say, “Wait ‘til you get to college!”, and colleges will say “Wait ‘til you get a job!”.  Employers are, thus, left having to freeze positions until they can find qualified outside help to do what needs to be done with an appropriate level of accountability.  HOPELESSNESS, INDEED!      

Finally, our innate penchant for avoiding responsibility has the net/ultimate effect of pulling the rug out from under ourselves:

“Goldbricking, also known in computer-related tasks as cyberslacking or cyberloafing, generally refers to an employee doing less work than they theoretically could. A modern example is staff who use their work internet access for personal reasons while maintaining the appearance of working, which can lead to inefficiency ... Some estimate goldbricking costs employers $1 billion a year in computer resources.

Goldbricking became a mainstream topic when Yahoo! announced in late February of 2013 that it was banning the practice of telecommuting because it discovered its remote employees were not logging into the corporate VPN often enough.”  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goldbricking

Given all of the above, we’re not generally as hopeless and helpless as we may make ourselves out to be.  While we can blame the government, the economy, Wall Street, Democrats, the 1%, etc., until doomsday, we have to own up to our own responsibility to preclude hopelessness, haplessness and helplessness. 

Even the Almighty gets unfairly blamed.  An unwillingness to use wisely the talents and resources already bestowed on us will make the Almighty appear to be inept, uncaring and inattentive:

A massive flood was ravaging the region.  As dire circumstances turned grim, a man was seen clinging to a chimney on the roof of his house praying for God to deliver him to safety.  A fellow in a canoe came by and offered to take him to higher ground, but the stranded man declined, saying: “God will save me!” A fellow in a motorboat came by and threw him a lifeline, but the stranded man threw it back, exclaiming loudly: “God will save me!”  The water continued to rise. Just as the house began to lose its moorings, a helicopter flew by.  The pilot lowered a harness line for rescue.  But, again, the stranded man rejected it, saying: “God will save me!”  Only moments later, the house finally gave way and the man drowned.  When he found himself at the Pearly Gates, he was furious and demanded to speak personally with the Almighty.  He cried, “How could you have abandoned me in my greatest hour of need?”  After a deafening moment of silence there was a sobering response: “I sent you a flood warning, a canoe, a motorboat and a helicopter – what else could you possibly have been expecting?”  Hopeless & Helpless!

Yes, OTHERS are absolutely critical to our success – perhaps even including the Divine.  Some will be helpful and some not.  But we’re definitely NOT going to do it without applied personal effort!  However, we need to connect meaningfully with significant others who can help and we need to make ourselves “Helpable”.  We need to be “Players”.  Hopefully and Helpfully “Making It” involves positive, deliberate engagement.  The human spirit requires both support and affirmation.  Go GET some and go GIVE some!   And remember:  Everything you deserve is going to take everything you’ve got, and “Just Deserts” will not forever be denied!  Quartermaster

Immersion

One of the biggest challenges for teenagers and young adults (which is not recognized as a challenge “in the trenches”, of course) is how to productively utilize UNSCHEDULED TIME. 

Point of Reference

We start with the foundational premise here

that there is no such thing as “FREE TIME”.

What kind of time are we talking about? 

If you figure students spend 8 hours a day coming and going from school, 1 hour of homework, 2 hours in extracurricular activity, 1.5 hours eating and 8 hours sleeping, that leaves roughly 3 hours of otherwise unscheduled time in a day.  Throw in a “study hall” and take away the extracurricular activity and you have roughly 6 hours of unscheduled time available.  Skip the homework (Oh, Yeah …) and you have 7 hours!  [I volunteered in two programs with fifth graders this past year and watched it happen with frightening regularity.]

How do they use this time?  They’re not really all that different from the “average” American:

Census Bureau Report 2006 /\ NBC Nightly News 12/15/2006

Americans spend 65 days a year watching television

Americans spend the equivalent of 5 months a year in a combination of frivolous activities which include:

            Surfing the Net::Watching TV::Listening to MP3 Files

In his book, Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell reported a plethora of studies suggesting that TOP DOG producers and performers log approximately 10,000 hours of fairly intense immersion in their respective disciplines and trades before becoming widely recognized in their field. 

Figuring 6 hr./day X 7 days or 42 hr./week (relevant school work and extracurricular activity would count), it would take roughly 240 weeks, or close to five years of concentrated immersion to reach 10,000 hours – i.e., if one put every “reasonable” unscheduled moment to work. 

A Ph.D. degree requires approximately 12,000 hours of immersion beyond college (roughly 6,000 hours), generally over the course of 4-5 years. 

After spending five years equivalently immersed in social media and video games during the bulk of the unscheduled time of their formative years, a young adult may become widely … or not-so-widely … recognized in areas that have little or no currency in the marketplace at large. Untargeted/Unbridled (or “differently immersed”) “Time-Minding” is a high liability engagement.

Proactive assistance in immersive “Time-Minding” is available in many areas.  

Fayette County Public Schools in Kentucky have developed a number of “Immersion” programs to help straddle both gaps.  A Spanish Immersion program has recently been added.  But there are longstanding “Magnet School” programs, as well, such as Lexington Traditional Magnet School, Elementary Accelerated Program, Middle School Accelerated Program, School for the Creative and Performing Arts, Liberal Arts Academy, and Math, Science & Technology.  In addition, there are programs in Individually Prescribed Education, the Academy of Information Technology, StationArts, Pre-Engineering, International Baccalaureate Diploma, JROTC, Carter G. Woodson Academy and STEAM Academy.

Finding your IMMERSION MEDIUM is a critical exploration.  Understanding what “makes you tick” is a great starting point. 

It could be a job … a “profession” … a career

It could be a hobby

It needs to be something engaging

It needs to be something “participative”

It needs to be something CHALLENGING

It needs to both require and support PERSONAL GROWTH

It needs to be ENERGIZING

If music is your immersion medium, don’t just collect other peoples’ music, make your own!

An interest in rocks can lead to a career or hobby in geology.

An interest in building stuff can lead to a career or hobby in architecture or engineering.

Immersion in great literature or great art can provide life-long exploration and engagement.

Write … draw … paint

An interest in history can uncover secrets of great civilizations and creative inventions, as well as lessons in what doesn’t contribute to the betterment of mankind. 

Immersion in science, and discovering new insights on what makes the world go around, how things work and how things can work better, is exhilarating! 

More than two-thirds of the earth is water.  Learn to swim, sail a boat …

Earth is but a grain of sand in the universe.  Immerse yourself in space / astronomy. 

There is SO MUCH to explore!

And there you are watching videos of cats,

and Facebooking photos of what you had for lunch!

A half-vast engagement in life breeds boredom, disappointment, sullenness, depression and regret – and a whole lot of other unpleasantries.  And vicarious living through superheroes is an empty kettle.  Use your precious unscheduled time to turn the kaleidoscope of the universe and touch all the possibilities of Great Wonderment.  Then follow YOUR path – totally IMMERSED – with everything that’s IN you!  Quartermaster

“Throw your heart over the fence and the rest of you will follow.”

Norman Vincent Peale

Absolutes

The tough part about life is the ABSOLUTES:

Two plus two is four, and no more!

Half of two twice is half of four once.

And how about this …

“Everything you deserve is going to take

everything you’ve got!”

For starters, our genes are our genes.  That’s it!  We’re absolutely and unequivocally stuck with the genes we’ve got for the duration ... except for mutations, which are almost always deleterious.  And one thing more:  Your genes may be “Special”, but it remains to be seen what you will do with them.

And TIME doesn’t stop.  It keeps moving.  Seconds turn into minutes, etc., with absolute regularity. 

A vastly underappreciated absolute is that the body is built to run on “natural” fuel and nutrition ... Yuck!   (It’s actually very adaptable but is optimally “tuned” to be most efficient with “natural” fuel and nutrition … and not so much otherwise.)  [Check out “7 Keys to Awesome Health” by Jana L. Fortner, N.D.]

And Olympians don’t get to be Olympians without pushing themselves to the absolute limits of their endurance … which allows them to build capacity to the absolute limits their genes will allow.  [While “doping” can help add capacity, it isn’t allowed … another absolute.]

Red lights are red lights for a reason. 

And drinking and driving and drugging and driving and texting and driving absolutely do not mix.  Period!

Eat too much sugar, salt and fat, and you’re going to become obese, have high blood pressure, be at risk for diabetes, cardiovascular disease, cancer, assorted non-descript miseries and a shortened life.  (But don’t they have pills for that … or surgical interventions … or – “well, I can always ‘walk my way back’ to health, if and when I decide it’s time to do so!”) 

The good news and bad news about ABSOLUTES is that “slippage” is rarely fatal … until it IS.  Destiny is forgiving enough and provides sufficient latitude to fly substantially under the radar of absolutes until we “Get It” – otherwise the species would never have survived!  You can uneventfully roll through stop signs, providing there are no other vehicles or police to contend with.  And you can load up on an occasional high calorie meal without dire consequences, unless you make it a habit, or it becomes an obsession or an addiction. 

Unfortunately, our natural inclination is one of pushing the maximum boundaries that “slippage” from absolutes will allow.  More bluntly, we are hell-bent on seeing how much we can get away with! The unrelenting “Pleasure Center” in the brain demands full (and absolute) engagement.  If a little is good, more has to be better.  And NOW would be never-so-much-too-soon to go ahead and indulge!  

Behavior modifications BACK toward absolutes from the edges of a slippage abyss CAN happen.  A non-fatal heart attack will often, but not always, lead to positive lifestyle changes in diet and exercise.  A diagnosis of lung cancer, COPD or emphysema will often, but not always, trigger a resolve to stop smoking.  Dire destitution from drug and alcohol abuse will often, but not always, trigger a resolve to get help in sobering up.  And a near disaster encountered at high speed can lead to more responsible driving. 

But there are points of no return –

points beyond which it is impossible to reclaim our full potential

and completely “right the ship”.

In 2014, Oprah Winfrey began a national tour for a program entitled “The Life You Want”.   

https://www.facebook.com/lifeyouwanttour.   I was curious about how a pursuit of “The Life You Want” might align with absolutes ... given that most of our gut-level “wants” fly about as far as one can get in the opposite direction.

It turns out that she raised the ante far above and beyond gut level wants, such as:

·         … all the cheese cake, chocolate cake and ice cream sundaes you can eat;

·         … all the TV you can watch;

·         … all the video games you can play;

·         … all the “Nothing” you’d like to do;

·         … all the cruises you’d like to take;

·         … all the alcohol and drugs you might like to indulge;

·         … etc.

She, and the VIP team she assembled, talked about things that were … well … more ULTIMATE or ABSOLUTE wants, such as:

“ … the things that matter in life ...

things like joy, resilience, awe, connection and gratitude.”

It turns out that such things are akin to core elements in Maslow’s epitomic “Self Actualization”.  

We might add such things as HEALTH, SECURITY, SUSTAINABILITY, SELF-ESTEEM, ALLIANCES and ASSOCIATIONS, SELF-EFFICACY, SELF CONFIDENCE, sense of CONTROL, FREEDOM FROM CONSTRAINT, and ABILITY TO CONTRIBUTE.

Such ascendant Life Mastery goals/ambitions/objectives – ultimate “WANTS” – are not attained with “catch-as-catch-can” wishes, hopes and dreams, total happenstance, or Fate, but by totally committed personal Vectoring toward absolute reckonings. 

While absolutes and perfection may be unachievable, excellence is not.  And both absolutes and perfection are at least approachable – even as “onward through the fog and fuzziness” we go.  The reward for trying is not guaranteed.  But the penalties for not giving it our best shot are. 

Point to Ponder

Those who are legitimately and measurably “making it”

are investing incredible amounts of time and energy

in absolutes.

So how do we cope with absolutes?  Be AWARE, ACKNOWLEDGE, ACCEPT and ALIGN with absolutes.  Do the highest, most “right” thing you can do NOW in the circumstances you find yourself NOW, and keep striving to do better.  It’s only a matter of time until the absolutes catch up with us … one way or the other.  Quartermaster

“Choose something like a star …” 

Robert Frost