Power UP

 “ … do not pray for easy lives but rather pray to become strong men and women.

Do not pray for a task equal to your power,

but rather pray for power equal to your task.

…

you will constantly be amazed at what you can do and become …” 

Phillips Brooks

According to Webster: Power is the “Ability to act; capacity for action …; capability of producing … an effect; the possession of sway or controlling influence over others; a person with authority or influence or exercising control.” 

More simply put, power sets things up and gets things done.

Although power can, and often is, used unwisely and sometimes nefariously, power is not, itself, an evil trait.  Nonetheless, the cynic could paint everything with a dark brush with some justification:

"Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Lord Acton

But, without the capacity to navigate or negotiate, we are vulnerable and impotent to effect our own wellbeing, never mind whatever our truest Destiny might be or that of the world at large. 

What are the elements that comprise POWER?   And how does one acquire this important attribute – not counting the protected entitlements with which we may presume to be endowed by virtue of the Bill of Rights and the Constitution?   

While the Almighty may be counted on by some to preferentially look after those whose “hairs on their heads are numbered”, it’s been suggested more compellingly that “God helps those who help themselves.”  

Stated a little more pointedly for those in the Christian community:

“God loves you just the way you are,

but He wants (expects!) you to be more like Jesus.”

Source Unknown 

Perhaps first and foremost in considering the acquisition of power, we should note the assertion that “Knowledge is Power.”  It follows that not knowing is a pronounced deficit or weakness.  Moreover, not knowing what we don’t know or that we don’t know – and/or not caring that we don’t know – constitutes a fatal flaw.  So we must know to be … and know more to be more – and know more and be more to deserve more.  

It’s important to note that there are at least 50 shades of gray associated with power and some of them can be deceiving.  In the early 1970s, multiple books and courses were offered on “Black Belt Management” – espousing power-commandeering techniques that were fundamentally geared to tyrannizing intimidation, particularly for self-promotion and negotiation.  However, the exercise of such power tends to isolate rather than consolidate and is no longer the front-running management style.   

In diametric contrast, the power of non-threatening innocence can be enormous: visualize the magnetic impact of an infant learning to walk or of a service dog on duty or of a homeless person in dire need or of a family member in mourning.   

But the most street-wise attribute of power is the unique capacity to fill a marketable need.  There is no substitute for being a “Go To” person who can deliver the highest quality goods.  The term “indispensible” comes to mind.  That’s both “knowing” and “doing”, and carries with it an implied capacity not only to do but to “teach” (consult).  Being the “expert” is where power resides.  It includes knowledge, skills/tools, professional engagement, cutting-edge craftsmanship, and excellence in execution.  Add to that creativity and change-agent visioning capacity, plus articulate communication and negotiation skills, and you have a winning Power-UP package.   

Now take YOUR power the next level UP.  Explore, Learn, Know, DO and BE!  That’s where real engagement is and where real power resides.  Your Destiny awaits!  Quartermaster

PEAK CONDITIONING

“If I miss one day’s practice, I notice it. 

If I miss two days, the critics notice it. 

If I miss three days, the audience notices it.”

Ignacy Paderewski, Pianist

[NOTE:  An absence of practice for two days is merely a weekend!]

Top athletes understand that an absence of “conditioning” for anything longer than two days results in significantly compromised performance.   

Military troops are engaged constantly in “conditioning” exercises. 

Nobody has ever been able to estimate the “conditioning window” for the general work force, since “Peak Performance” is so rarely seen.  And, where it threatens to occur, the very prospect attracts blatantly derogatory references such as:  “Work-A-Holic”, “Apple Polisher”, “Butt-Kisser”, “Got-No-Life”, “Anal Compulsive”, and “Over-Achiever”.   

Benchmarks of “fitness” or “conditioning” for the work-a-day world are tough to define.  For some, forcing themselves out of bed before noon and showing up at work for 7.5 hours per day – give or take a few – is viewed as an heroic effort, never mind whether anything useful is accomplished! 

If athletes were given medals based on levels of conditioning common in the work-a-day world, they would still be trying to break the 10-minute-mile and a 30 point basketball game!

“Conditioning” is important not only for Peak Performance and Peak Output when required on the field of battle, but also for reduced STRESS in preparing for and delivering the goods.  Persons accustomed to practicing Peak Performance ^___ i.e., maintaining job-mastery and life-mastery skills and continually cultivating new ones ^___ will be much better equipped to carry the load and deliver the goods – while maintaining a healthy level of sanity and “living to fight another day”.  (NOTE: There are scouting reports of a lot of “practicing” in the work place, but often not in any context applicable toward a corporate “bottom line”, personal advancement or sustainable engagement!)

Point to Ponder

Wildlife stay in peak condition because they have only two choices: either eat or be eaten.  Bushmen in the savannahs of Africa and jungles of the Amazon are similarly “peak- conditioned”. 

Domesticated cattle are only pressed to stay in “peak condition” for foraging … completely unaware of – and undaunted by – what’s coming at the end of the trail. 

At the very least, let’s not be like domesticated cattle, and, at the very BEST, let’s find our own very highest PEAK and keep PEAK CONDITIONING!  Quartermaster

Bindings

[Ref: David Brooks, New York Times, April 14, 2014:: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/15/opinion/a-long-obedience.html?ref=davidbrooks&_r=0]

In this piece, David Brooks takes a new look at Moses and the story of Exodus, a story of heroic liberation and “unbinding” from oppression.  In fact, the struggle for unbinding liberation from oppression permeates the history of the entire world.  Some uprisings are successful and some not; viz., the “Arab Spring” nations, Beijing, Tehran, Kiev, and countless others.  The key question is why the difference in outcome?  Why do some uprisings succeed and some fail? 

As Brooks points out, the Exodus story does not end with liberation – with the escape from unjust laws and unjust persecution.  Successful and sustainable unbinding uprisings are accompanied by a rebinding of the citizenry to new and higher-order and more just laws.  As Brooks puts it: “Liberating to freedom is the easy part.  RE-binding with just order and accepted compulsion is the hard part.”   

Whoa!  “Accepted compulsion”?  Alternative terms might be voluntarily yoked, submissive/ subjected subservience.  But the view here is of an enlightened, engaged, participatory, communally anchored and endorsed compulsion aimed toward higher purpose, principles and possibilities.    

Of course, the legal “bindings” Moses laid out for the Israelites were anything but “voluntary” or “participatory”, except in terms of acquiescence or “accepted compulsion”.   

Extremely important, Brooks points out, “ … the first people who need to be bound down [to the law] are the leaders themselves.”  Such a view stands in stark contrast to the innate tendency of leaders to think of themselves as essentially “makers of the law” or “caretakers and enforcers of the law”, and, thus, separate from the law or “above the law”. 

 

However, with sanctionable leadership appropriately bound, “ … Exodus is a reminder that … good laws can nurture better people.  … the general vision is that the laws serve many practical … purposes. For example, they provide a comforting [guiding] structure for daily life ...

The laws tame the ego and create habits of deference by reminding you of your subordination to something permanent [and unassailable] … The laws build community by anchoring belief in common practices … The laws moderate the pleasures; they create guardrails that are meant to restrain people from going off to ... extremes.

The 20th-century philosopher Eliyahu Dessler wrote, “the ultimate aim of all our service is to graduate from freedom to compulsion.” Exodus provides a vision of movement that is different from mere escape and liberation. The Israelites are simultaneously moving away and being bound upward.”

Point to Ponder

Our “bindings” most graphically define us.  Bindings to family, culture, job/career, habits, fraternities/sororities, religious affiliations, political persuasions, dreams, goals, principles, etc., determine, in largest part, who we are – and where we are BOUND.  Bindings contain both visioning and vectoring attributes, which, together, drive onward and upward progression.  

Paradoxically, without higher order bindings, we are not more liberated but are even more constrained … “saddled” by lower order “default” bindings (appetites, vices and “victimhood”) that are patently impermanent, non-constructive and unsustainable. 

On the “flip” side, a person is never so free to fly as when he has hitched his wagon to a star.  And a kite can’t rise unless or until it is appropriately anchored.  Moreover one can soar higher with more “Unbridled Spirit” when bound to a Dream.  The difference is a difference between aimless wandering and targeted vectoring – also akin to the difference between pursuit of a golden egg and a chase after the next jelly bean. 

Other Points to Ponder

Habits reflect and reinforce our bindings – either upward or downward. 

Discipline in the execution of principles and practicalities associated with our “bindings”

largely determines the direction and distance we will go.

Final Thought: The “Greatest Good” may, in fact, be the act of binding oneself with “accepted compulsion” to a Dream or Destiny or Ideal or Mission or Purpose or Passion that is not only worth living for but worth dying for.  Quartermaster

Fired UP

“Ya know what makes me sick?

Ya know what makes me so mad

I just wanna chew up a box of ten-penny nails and spit ‘em

in the gas tank of an 18 wheeler?

… ”

Earl Pitts, Uhmerikan

What’s it gonna take to get you FIRED UP? 

Gross Injustice?

Embarrassment to a point of shame?

Bankruptcy?

Unmowed grass?

Obamacare? 

The real question here is: What does it take to get us Fired UP enough to DO something about something?  [Truth be told, we’d just rather NOT if we don’t have to!]  

But DOING stuff is LIFE – it’s the game we’re in – for better or worse, for richer or poorer … !

“ … and if you aren’t in it to win, what the heck are you still doing here?”

Linus Torvalds

What about getting Fired UP to realize your Dreams?

 … overcome the tough challenges?

… beat the competition?

… forestay and forestall disaster? 

Where’s your passion?

What’s your poison? 

“People are like sticks of dynamite;

they’ve got awesome potential inside, but nothing happens until the fuse gets lit.”

Mac Anderson 

When it’s half-past time for the rubber to meet the road – and that may well be NOW – somebody’s gotta get out the matches, the flint stones or the blow torch and light the fuse. 

But, let’s face it: It’s not all that easy, even when there’s “Hell to pay” for failing to deliver the goods:  

It’s been said that the University of Kentucky locker room had to have the paint replaced after every half-time shake-down of the basketball team by Tubby Smith on their way to winning the National Championship in 1998.   

We’re better than THAT! 

“It was a rare night when there wasn’t blood on the floor because we were beating each other up … everything was a competition … we strive to make the world a better place … you never rest on the last victory.  There’s always more to do [better], which has sort of created this perpetual-motion machine of energy and exuberance … my father’s admonition [was] that offense is the best defense.  We don’t give up.”  Zeke Emanuel, author of Brothers Emanuel (interviewed by Belinda Luscombe for Time magazine, April 1, 2013, p. 60)

We need to make the world a better place.  We need to make US better citizens and more productive contributors.  The very BEST that's in us needs to be OUT.  We need to create more HOPE for the future – more promise … more optimism.  THAT’S worth getting Fired UP about!   

“I’m not interested in blind optimism, but I’m very interested in optimism that is hard-won, that takes on darkness and then says, ‘This [darkness] is not enough.’”       Colum McCann 

Let’s get FIRED UP and put some darkness behind us!  Quartermaster

Life's Toughest Lesson

"None of you is special.

You are not special.

You are not exceptional."

David McCullough, teacher, addressing Wellesley High School graduates

June 2012

 This admonition comes as a sobering comeuppance for all of us raised in a virtual Prairie Home Companion universe “ … where all the women are strong, all the men are good looking, and all the children are above average.” [Garrison Keillor]  

The worst part is that we are advertently and unapologetically lulled into thinking “the world is our oyster” by life, itself:   

We come into the world under extremely artificial circumstances, sheltered on all sides, above and below from all the vicissitudes of life.  We immediately become the center of doting attention from parents and extended family.  By around age 1, we learn to walk by ourselves.  Whoa!  By age 2, we learn to control the external world with the word “No!”, not to mention the effectiveness of whining and tantrums.  From ages 5 through 18, we are automatically advanced in school – with gratuitous grade inflation along the way.  With plenty of food in-sourced from all over the planet, we grow bigger, stronger and our bodies mature.  By age 16, we’re deemed of age to drive an automobile.  By age 18, we’re deemed sufficiently matriculated to graduate high school.  And at age 21 – official “drinking age”, we are declared independent adults … “Captains of our own Destiny” … answerable only to the beat of our own drum.  Wow!  Is life wonderful, or what!?!   

By the time reality sets in, the stakes have reached just short of unmanageable heights – if we’re lucky.

“There’s an important gap between illusion and reality.

It’s only a matter of time until reality takes over.”

John Bogle

Here’s how it’s supposed to work:

 Society invests in our wellbeing to a point of providing everything we need or could want at the outset.  This investment (amounting to more than $300,000 by age 18) is not because we’re “Special”.   The purpose of this investment is to get us as completely and productively to a point of independence as possible.  With time, the societal investment decreases and we are expected to pick up the slack … which we do with great umbrage and recalcitrance. 

With the imposition of such untenable expectations, the unperturbed moment becomes our sanctuary, over which we deign to exercise absolute sovereignty.  “Free time” is ours for the making and taking, because …, well …, because it’s one of the few things, overall, that we can declare is truly OURS! 

Which brings us to the second troubling truth:  Unscheduled time is not now and never was, in fact, “Free Time”.  Unscheduled time is the best opportunity we will ever have to invest in our own wellbeing. 

“Time is God’s way of keeping everything from happening at once.”

(Source Unknown) 

Blow that opportunity and we can kiss our fondest Dreams goodbye. 

The final correlative hidden truth here is that the stakes keep getting higher.  There are no parking lots.  There is no “arrival terminal”.  We are expected not only to carry our own weight (self-coaching) with progressively increasing responsibility, but to contribute back toward the societal investment required for succeeding generations ... keeping in mind that there’s a stiff thermodynamic tax off the top of whatever we put in, not counting Murphy’s Law, missteps, misfortunes or whatever Fate has in store along the way.  

So Life’s Tough!  And it’s particularly so if we insist on carrying forward our own unfounded assumptions and unrealistic expectations acquired early in the going. 

“The way most of us prepare for life is akin to packing shorts and a T-shirt

for what is more like a polar expedition.”

Poster at Quartermaster’s Headquarters

The good news is that thousands of generations have survived life’s vicissitudes, and countless individuals have, in fact, thrived, despite both the odds and the challenges.  And, while toughness can be learned and acquired as necessary, the real substance of success is simply raising our sights and selves above an artificial dependence on societal subsidies to become all that we CAN be.  Life does not require more of us than we can deliver.  Quartermaster

“There is only so much you can do, but you have to do that much.”

Garrison Keillor, on Prairie Home Companion

Slow Motion Visioning

I’m fascinated by superstar players in sports – how they almost seem to see things in slow motion despite the frenetic pace of a game and can seemingly adjust in mid-air.   

Some of that enhanced performance comes from having “seen” so many similar “field” situations in the past (i.e., they’ve put in their 10,000+ hours).  Thus, they almost automatically know what’s going to happen in advance (e.g., the defensive player is moving to the right and can’t stop, or that ground ball is going to hop waist-high, not knee-high). 

And I’m sure that hyper-acute awareness, combined with instant reaction times to subtle changes in circumstance, plays a key role. 

But I’m suspecting that some degree of enhanced performance also relates to extraordinarily fast contextual processing – to a point that what passes in an instant for the casual observer can actually be “seen” unfolding with elongated broadband perception by the superstar.  (Maybe that’s also true for the referees, with whom we frequently have differing perceptions? Or maybe not!)

Focus and anticipation are additional key factors in recognition, processing and reaction. 

What’s frustrating to the avid fan – not to mention to the star or superstar athlete … or to the coach – is inconsistency.  Why does it all happen to near perfection some of the time and NOT all of the time … in particular, at extremely crucial times?  How could the highly ranked and rated University of Kentucky basketball team – which has had strokes of brilliance throughout the season – struggle so much against unranked teams so late in the season – and especially on their home court?   Competing teams always seem to take the floor against Kentucky already “pumped” to the max! 

In “Top Dog”, Bronson and Merryman point out that elite performance in everything from chess to highly exacting surgery to world cup dog handling to soccer is associated with an anticipatory rise in testosterone, plus a continuing rise of T-levels during performance.  However, this is not necessarily the case with chess Masters playing in local or regional tournaments, where they have much lower angst about the competition and where they occasionally lose. 

It almost seems that “fast-tracking” individuals go “off-line” when not sufficiently challenged ... a kind of "tortoise versus hare" problem: 

·         Relaxing to a fault against lesser opponents

·         Daydreaming in slow traffic

·         Texting while driving

·         Etc.

We understand that the testosterone rise is not a “triggering” or “initiating” event but a “sustaining” response to neural “prepping”.  However, it suggests that whatever testosterone is doing is an excellent marker of whatever else is happening.  More simply put, if an elite competitor is not UP for a game – whatever that means and however it happens – the chance for success is markedly diminished.    

So the job for an elite player, and for his or her coach, is to figure out how to consistently move the ready-meter UP for peak performance.  How do they get the adrenalin and testosterone flowing and lock-in the anticipation, the visioning, the hyper-acute awareness, the focus, the penetrating, broadband perception and the super-speed contextualization?  More to the point, how do WE do it? 

I can’t wait to finish the book!   Stay tuned.  Quartermaster

Hiding in Plain Sight

LIFE’S TOUGH 

The CHALLENGES are formidable,

the RESPONSIBILITIES awesome,

the EXPECTATIONS out-of-sight, and

TIME is always too short for what we want and need to do.

To protect ourselves from the vicissitudes of life, we often hide in variably constructed “shells” – each of us having our own personal mode of sheltering from the storms. 

·         Some of us busy ourselves to exhaustion in trivial pursuits. 

·         Shop-a-holics shop.

·         Alcoholics hide in a bottle.

·         Drug addicts mind-travel to unpredictable places as far from the real world as possible.

·         “Millennials” do video games, Facebook, Twitter and You Tube surfing.  

·         Work-a-holics submerse themselves in work.

·         Dogged “homemakers” immerse themselves in cooking, sewing, cleaning, etc.

·         Farmers immerse themselves in farming.

·         Writers immerse themselves in writing.

·         Politicians – well, politicians hide behind anything and everything, including a whole lot of smoke screens!

·         Increasing numbers of folks are getting “hooked” on exercise.

·         Some only live and breathe for the next bingo game, soap opera, or sports event.

·         Some hide behind excuses, explanations, and trumped up calamities.

·         Some are overcome by “family obligations”.

·         Significant numbers immerse themselves in community service activities.

·         “Professional students” escape into the ivory towers of academia.

·         The numbers hiding in a world of made-up fantasy are unknown, but are likely legion.

Some of these “hiding places” and practices are patently unsustainable and potentially devastating, while others can have very positive outcomes.  An over-achieving work-a-holic can literally change the world (ala, Steve Jobs, Jonas Salk or Madame Curie) and a dogged homemaker can provide a haven of respite for family and friends. 

However, it’s worthwhile – and very likely important – to take periodic inventory of our hiding places and practices to determine how well things are working and toward what probable or possible ends. 

The truly fortunate are those who emerge from the fray with sufficient capacitization and self-efficacy to take on the world as it comes – “sheltered” by their own … and their surrounding “village’s” … ability to cope with life’s vicissitudes and exigencies head on. 

Let’s immerse (“shell”) ourselves in the very best we know (worthy challenges) and can possibly muster (gain the capacity) toward the greatest good (most legitimate) we can fathom, as well armed (efficacious) as possible.  Quartermaster