Well, Christmas has happened and New Year’s is coming. And, it’s quite possible that you’ve experienced the dark side of the holidays by now. It’s something that is talked about a lot and certainly needs to be talked about more.
So, what is the dark side of Christmas? Well, let’s first consider what Christmas is supposed to be. It’s supposed to be a time of good cheer. A time of joy, hope and love. And, parts of it are to some people some of the time. But, for many people Christmas and the holidays are not what they are marketed as. For example, many families have already experienced the “holiday fight” where emotions got a little tense and words got said that you may regret. Isn’t it strange how a time to celebrate our friends and family can actually put the greatest strain on those relationships.
But, here is the real dark side of Christmas. Many people don’t even have family to feud with. Or, if they do, they don’t see them. For others, a death in the family or other tragedy removes the joy and hope of the season. For many who are lonely throughout the rest of the year, the holiday season is just an exclamation point on how they feel about themselves or their lives.
My challenge to all of us is to be more aware of those around us who might not be having a lot of fun during this “festive” season. Who around you really doesn’t enjoy the holidays? Who might be lonely? Who feels left out? And, why can’t we talk more about this? If we talk more about it, we can truly make it a season of joy, hope and love for so many more people.
Recently, I heard a radio phone-in on a subject that I completely believe in. The topic was on people being lonely anywhere, including when being surrounded by a crowd of people. So true.
Most people have felt lonely at some point while being in the middle of a big crowd, in a downtown of a city, at a concert, a shopping mall, etc. This condition is a concern and I certainly hope that everyone experiences this as infrequently as possible.
The above example is largely one of an involuntary condition. But, it does remind me of a situation that I’ve seen before that is voluntary. Let me describe a scene I saw when down sailing on our boat in the Caribbean. We were having dinner at a restaurant in a marina. While we were eating I noticed a group of people on a motorboat docked in one of the slips. Remember that we were in a truly beautiful place on a comfortably warm evening with a gorgeous sunset. What I saw initially was that a couple of people were talking to each other while most where just sitting there. Within a short period of time, every single person stopped talking to each other. And, very soon after that, each one of them had pulled out a cell phone and started talking to someone else somewhere else.
I’m always amazed when I see something like this happen, but it baffles me when it happens in such a place – a beautiful place, where all was good, where they had their travelling companions right there, where it was one of the few evenings that they have while on holiday. I just don’t get it. They choose to spend money on their cell phones (assuming that they were all visitors) to talk to somebody who wasn’t there.
I know that there may be some reason why the scene turned out the way it did, but it still illustrates what I believe is a problem in our society. Our inability to talk to and carry on conversations with other people that we know and love. Sometime it takes a little bit of effort and practice to continue or extend a conversation, but isn’t it worth it? Often we can learn a great deal from other people if we just try a little harder. And, often in the process, we learn a little bit more about ourselves.
So, let’s put away the cellphones and honour those people around us with some attention.
This is a bit of a silly story but still one with a good learning point.
It started when I went looking for a new car. I researched the features that I wanted and I filtered my needs down to one car. Next step, to go for a test drive. The result… I was quite happy. But, there was one thing bothering me. The speedometer and other dials were laid out in a really different style. Completely unnerving. But, I really liked the car.
I immediately knew that this was going to be a great experience. I knew that it was going to take some getting used to. And, it did, for a while. But, with so many things, once I got used to it, I loved it.
Isn’t that so true? The same thing happened when I had to go to a ‘chiclet’ keyboard for the first time with my present laptop. It took a bit of getting used to as well. But, I’m so happy that I chose to take the plunge. It was a great decision.
When was the last time that you had to stretch yourself out of your comfort zone. It might be time to stretch some more. Let me know your story.
In the category of weird but interesting research comes some research into Botox and happiness.
Researchers studied women who underwent Botox injections in their face and compared them to a control group. What they discovered was that the women who had the Botox work done, generally felt happier. What’s interesting is the reason. The women who had the Botox are physically less able to frown or have a “sour” face.
So, that old adage to smile and you’ll feel better seems to have been confirmed. Or, at least the less you have a frown, the less you’re going to feel down. (rhyming intended).
One small caveat here is that we do not need to have Botox injections to have an effect.
I had the great fortune to receive a spa weekend for my wife and I as a gift from a client. It was a great gift and we had a wonderful weekend. And, believe it or not, during my massage, I learned a wonderful metaphor.
As a person who like connecting with people, I was chatting with the massage therapist. I asked her how much “tension” she found. Fortunately, she said that there wasn’t a lot but that there was some. Before I could react, she said… “But, that’s good. If we didn’t have some tension or stress, we’d fall over.”
What a great metaphor, we need a little bit of tension to keep us standing up otherwise we’ll go limp and fall over without the ability to do anything.
What more do I need to say… as many of us have heard before, we need to have some stress in our lives, some pressure to keep us going and motivated. But perhaps not too much so that we don’t end up with too many painful debilitating knots.
This past weekend was a reminder that there are lessons everywhere. Just be ready and open for them.
That was a line in a song I heard recently. When I heard it, I was quite impressed with the metaphor and thought what a great reminder for how we should deal with other people.
Why you ask.
Because a still river is often still moving very quickly. There can be a lot of stuff happening below the surface that we can’t easily see without looking deeper literally or figuratively.
And, this is true for us as people. Often when we meet people, we may not get much of a sense of how “their river runs”. It might be quite deep and fast. For us to enjoy the real nature of their river, we will need to spend some time getting deeper.
And, of course, it’s always good not to make too many assumptions about a still river. You may think it is calm and still but step in and you might just get swept away.
Today, I had a great reminder of something that I’ve known for quite a while. Having said that, isn’t it nice to be gently or not so gently reminded of life’s truths from time to time.
What I was reminded of was who is my greatest advocate.
Before I tell you, can you tell me who is your greatest advocate? Go ahead and take a moment. Think of all the people you connect with from day to day. Who is looking out for you? Who has your interests at heart?
Likely you came up with a number of people, but there is a person who will always be most interested in you and frankly will have the best understanding of you and what you need….. It’s you!
Now, your initial reaction may be…. Sure, I guess you’re right but I don’t want to be egotistical. Shouldn’t I be concerned about others. And, yes, you should not be egotistical. And, you should be concerned with others. But, you can get to a point where you spend so much time looking after others that you don’t take care of yourself and you suffer and become less valuable to everyone.
At the end of the day, only one person can truly look after you and your needs. Only one person truly understands your needs. Even other people who care for you and want to be your advocate, will not know every detail. Again, does this mean that other people can’t be great advocates for you…. No, they can be wonderful advocates and from time to time they will be able to tell you truths that you may not realize.
So, the ultimate truth is that you need others to support you AND, you need to be your own best advocate. This means taking your own inventory of yourself, mapping out a strategy for where you need to go and then getting on that journey of destinations as I blogged about not so long ago.
Artists are expected to have creativity. And, so many times, artists come up with truly inspiring, or even just plan fun, creations. Even with only a few household items, in the hands of someone creative, they can help to create a story.
As many of you know, my family and I are going to be sailing through the Caribbean in 2012 so the following picture caught my attention.
What a wonderfully example of creativity!
The key here is that it should not be just artists and the “right” brained of us who are creative. We all need to be creative in our personal and professional lives.
So, when will be your next opportunity to play with your food? [Okay, my kids will be excluded from this challenge :-]
Tell me how you are going to be creative this month.
I received this video from a friend today. I’m quite busy and frankly didn’t have the time to look at it. But, I thought that I should out of an obligation to my friend.
I am so glad I did. The result is that it is good. Very good. Good enough that I stopped what I was doing to send out this blog.
I dare you to start watching it and to keep watching it. I don’t care what kind of day you’re having, by the end of it, if you’re not at least smiling, I will be very surprised. In fact, I’d love for you to resp0nd to me if you don’t get a smile out of it.
And, if you do…. then pass my post along to others, and tell us about it.
One, they involve an area that I love, “perception”. Here’s an example of the ad that show’s how we can all perceive things differently. It’s wonderfully different and makes a point.
Second, they struck out and started to use an area that was previously unused. And, now they “own” that space. We all think of them when we travel and specifically expect to see their ads when we’re heading on to our plane. It is very strong marketing.
With these points they are developing their brand very well. They want to be “the world’s local bank”, and by placing their common ads in similar “locals” around the world, they’ve done that. They give people the impression that they are local everywhere. In fact, they are in about 49 different airports and have over 8000 offices around the world. The ads speak to their branding.
They also hint strongly at how perception is important to your financial success and how each individual’s solution needs to be different. Also, they show that it is important to them as an entity which is important for the consumer to know. Again, well done.
With these ads they invite the perception that they are a different from other banks, which is exactly what they want you to understand and it is in line with their branding completely.
There are many good lessons in these ads, as well as the fact that they are just good fun too.
What can be useful to learn from the ads is the issue of authenticity to your brand. How authentic are you? How authentic are you to your brand?
If you don’t believe that you have a brand either as an individual or with your company or organization, I would suggest that you should think again.
Consider how authentic you are to your brand and how you can better advertise your branding.
Many people have heard the saying that “Less is More”. I have and I’ve used the saying. In fact, I bought into the saying until recently. The concept was that sometimes, we just make things too complicated. We add too many variables, or choices, or options, or details, or… words. The idea behind “Less is More” is that we all want more and for that reason, sometimes choosing less is actually more helpful or more beneficial to us.
Here is where the crux is. The idea that what is better is “More” and thus to explain to someone that what they want is something better, and thus it must be “More”.
I think we need a new paradigm. We need to not think of better as only being “More”. It can also be “Less”. We need to recondition our thinking to realize that we can get caught up in the disease of “More” to our detriment. And, to be clear, “Less” is not always better. Sometimes we need “More”. It depends.
So, join me in restoring the concept that “Less is Less, and More is More”, and what we want or need can be “More” or “Less”.
It’s necessary. I’ve needed to clean out and organize my office for a long time. Too long as with many of us. But, the truth is that it is also the right time. But, that’s a completely different blog post.
Cleaning out my office I noticed an award I received for leadership when I was in university. It was a very big award and in fact was the first of it’s kind given out. The memory that came back when I saw the award wasn’t one of joy, accomplishment, pride or anything else. It was a feeling right in the pit of my stomach. It was an “Oh no, I didn’t do that” kind of feeling. I’m sure that you’re surprised at this. Not a normal feeling. Well the reason for the feeling was a result of the award ceremony.
All of the leaders being honoured were at a big banquet and celebration. At the time, I was well known and well respected for my leadership. I’d done a lot and had moved the organization forward. And, there were a number of awards that I could have potentially been nominated for and subsequently perhaps even won.
As much as I wasn’t expecting anything (or so my conscious mind told myself), I did expect that they would recognize my work in some way. Well, the awards started and as each award that I thought I had a chance of winning was handed out, my name was not called. What this did was create a fair bit of anxiety at first, but then, it started to turn more into frustration and being upset. In fact, all of the awards had been handed out and I was not the recipient of any of them. I was not happy.
Now, there was a new award that was going to cap the evening off. But, I knew that I would not be in the running for that one. So, I was left sitting in the room feeling quite upset that many of my colleagues had been recognized but I hadn’t.
Imagine my emotions when they were describing the last award. I wasn’t even really listening, I was so focused on my own “woe”. But, then my name was called for this new award. I was shocked initially. I honestly didn’t think that it was even possible I would get the award. Then, the second emotion sank in. I had been so upset at not being recognized and now they were recognizing me with their highest honour.
That was a humbling experience! And, continues to be to this day, and even writing this article reinforces the dangers around expectation thinking and taking things too seriously. And, finally, it’s always good to be humbled now and then. It keeps us on course and refocuses each one of us.
I’ve recently been going through a lot of books that I’ve had on my reading shelves (read the plural). And, I’m making great headway. One interesting thing that I noticed the other evening was how many authors (and colleagues), promoted the fact that people listen to much to their head. That we should be more in tune with our emotional side. This is interesting, but it bothered me. And, in fact, it has bothered me for a long time. So, here is my rant on the head and the heart.
The Head. There have been periods in history where great emphasis was placed on the logical (or what is incorrectly referred to as left brain thinking). Even today, many people still believe that thinking things through is the best way to do things.
The Heart. As I mentioned, there are many pundits out there who believe that this world should be run by our emotions. Or, our lives should at the very least have more direction created by our emotional side (or again what is incorrectly referred to as right brain thinking).
I believe that both types of thinking are fine. And, before I go on, let me say that we need both kinds of thinking. But, I do believe that there is another type of thinking that is generally more accurate, thinking with your gut.
Now before I go on, I want to define what I mean by gut. Some of you may use the term gut to mean thinking with your heart or your emotions. That’s not what it means to me. To me, going with your gut is something different. Your gut is that sense you get get about what is the right thing to do. It combines knowledge from your logical side, your emotions and likely a number of other senses you may not be aware of. It take all the information in and sythesizes a response for you.
Again, I do believe that there is a place for solely logical or emotional thinking but I often feel that we talk to much about only the two options and don’t discuss what many people – business people, athletes, explorers, leaders and others – use to achieve world class performance, their gut sense.
When you think of the word “inspiration” most of you will think of a word that could be defined as:
– Arousing to a particular emotion or action –
You may think of people that are an inspiration for others. You may think of those things that cause people to be motivated to do great things.
If we look a little more about “inspiration”, we do learn more about the word and more importantly perhaps what it really means. Another definition of “inspiration” is the following:
– The act of drawing in, especially the inhalation of air into the lungs –
And, if look at the history of the word, we see that it comes from inspirare from in-”in” + spirare “to breathe”. So, inpiration can mean “to breathe in”. I learned this definition from my association’s monthly audio cd and it struck me as an important definition.
If we think of inspiration as the act of breathing in, I think that it helps us learn how to be inspired. We just need to breathe in the world around us. We need to be open to what’s around us. If we’re not willing to breathe in what’s around us, then we are unlikely to be inspired. I believe there is an important truth in this metaphor.
There are many different ways to define who people are.
You can describe a person by their family, their physical characteristics, their work, their friends, and even their desires. There is , however, one way that I have not heard before. It describes us in a unique way that misses a lot of information but in most ways it captures who we are. It informs people of who we are, what’s important to us, and most importantly describes our legacy to the world.
At the end of the day, I believe that we are predominantly a collection of our stories. What really defines us is the stories that we create. And, make no mistake, each of us makes our own stories. We are in control of the stories and whatever is important to us is where we’ll put our effort.
So, what are the stories that you’re creating. What do they tell about you? What stories have you not yet created? Tell me. I’d love to hear how stories define who you are.
Visiting with friends in the British Virgin Islands, I was reminded about a piece of wisdom from my wife’s colleague. In fact, I may have been last told this piece of wisdom many years ago from him.
He’s an easy going, successful part of the British Virgin Island community and holds many pieces of wisdom. So, when the conversation somehow turned to all the things that we “gotta do”, he stopped the conversation with one thought.
“All you ever gotta do is breathe.” Simple and true. All that anyone has to do is breathe. You don’t have to do anything else. Everything else is a choice and likely, in the whole scheme of things…. not as important as you think it is.
I have the pleasure from time to time with my work to stay at a truly world class hotel. Recently, I was again honoured to stay there for a week while I was working. And, I believe that I can sum up their success in 2 words…. My Pleasure. Why do these 2 words, that every employee uses all the time, make them a success? For a number of reasons that I think that we can apply to our own work and frankly, our own lives.
First, it is their pleasure. What I mean is that they are taking ownership and defining that they are the owners of your impression of the hotel. Second, they not only say that it is there pleasure, but, they also believe it. Each and every person, truly enjoys being there for you in whatever role they play. For most of us, we don’t believe this. And, in fact, we can even become suspicious of people who truly enjoy their work. But, here, everyone feeds off the energy of the other employees and their guests. Do they sometimes have down times? Yes, but is that there default standard? No.
My Pleasure is the foundation of their customer service success. And, their customer service success is the foundation of their differentiation and of their business success.
It’s a great lesson for everyone. How can we make our work… My Pleasure.
Let me know about your thoughts and how you make what you do… Your Pleasure.
I had the opportunity to watch the movie Invictus the other day. It is the true story based on the South African Rugby team as they try to win the 1995 World Cup of Rugby to gain the honour of their country, the host nation.
For me, there were 2 great lessons. One, is the undervalued and underappreciated virtue of forgiveness. I think that many or even most people thought that South Africa could not go through the process of reconcilitation. But, in the end, they did and it was the right thing to do. Did it resolve all of there problems, no. But, it certainly put them in a better position than they would have been in any other case. Forgiveness can help heal and unlock a lot of hidden hurt that we experience.
The second lesson was the power of aspiration. If you don’t aspire to be greater today than you were the day before, you are certainly not going to be on the road to being all that you can be. And, this rugby team truly aspired to be more than they were, more than others thought they could be and even more than they thought they could be themselves.
As many of you will agree, a movie or a story has the wonderful ability to create inspiration and aspiration. I would suggest that this is one of those stories.
What stories, movies, songs, or books have been inspirational to you?
This weekend was a great experiment for me in terms of the power of the eyes.
Captain Jo's Breast Friends With My Wife Taking The Photo
I was honoured to be a part of my wife’s challenge to walk 60 kilometres as part of the weekend to end all women’s cancers. The role that my 3 sons and I played was the same as last year — to be the best road team out there. We were there to support my wife’s team – Captain Jo’s Breast Friends. So, what did we do? We followed all the teams. We had supplies for them if they needed it. But, the most important role that we could play was to support all the walkers on their personal journey over the 2 days.
So, what do you do to support people who are often doing something that is pretty amazing and something that many have never done before in their life. We provided music – upbeat music to give them a lift. There is something very powerful about music and how it can support the human condition – the human soul. We also clapped. We cheered. We shouted.
The most important thing that we could do is to be there for each and every person individually. To make them feel like we were there for them and only them. I found that the best way to do this was to do something that will come as no surprise…. to look at each person, to look into their eyes and to give them as personal a message as possible. It might have been that we were proud of them, that they were doing very well, that this was the toughest hill on the circuit, that they looked really good, that it was amazing that they were still smiling. It didn’t really matter as long as it fit as best as possible with them. And, like I mentioned the most important part was to look into their eyes.
Looking into their eyes, reinforced our sincerity, it gave them a sense of trust that we were truly there for them. Having eye contact meant that for that brief fleeting moment, you were sharing in their personal journey, their personal triumph in some cases. Eye contact is so important to us as human beings.
We did that last year and people remembered us. And, again this year, we made a real difference. It was an amazing experience for me, and it so dramatically reinforced what’s really important and what’s important about the human condition. People who never thought they could accomplish this big goal were able to make it and we were there for them and with them.
My challenge to you is to go out and discover how you can support people who are testing and exploring their limits. You will grow in the experience.
And, tell us all about your experience… we can’t wait to hear your stories.
Sometimes, you just need to get away to be able to go home. What does that mean? Well, sometimes if you spend too much time at home, you will find that you lose yourself. You lose who you are and what’s important to you.
And, to regain that sense of who you are, sometimes the only thing that you can do is to get away. This might mean that you need a vacation, sometime it might mean that you need to work in a different place. It all depends but it will usually mean that you have a physical change from what you are used to.
This physical change means that you are able to jar your senses and to be able to re-normalize your perceptions of who you are and what’s important to you. And, that’s the irony, when you need to go away just to be more comfortable with going home. More comfortable with who you are and where you’re going.
So, next time you’re challenged because you’re feeling stale, try going away, literally! And then, tell us about your experience.
Posted by Paul Frazer 
For me, there were 2 great lessons. One, is the undervalued and underappreciated virtue of forgiveness. I think that many or even most people thought that South Africa could not go through the process of reconcilitation. But, in the end, they did and it was the right thing to do. Did it resolve all of there problems, no. But, it certainly put them in a better position than they would have been in any other case. Forgiveness can help heal and unlock a lot of hidden hurt that we experience.
