Geoff Blades

Do You Think For Yourself?

The late Susan Jeffers wrote one of my favorite books – Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway.

What I liked so much about the way she thought was not only the way she distilled complex ideas in a simple way but she often had her own take, which differed from the mainstream.

This newsletter will show you what I mean.  Some of these ideas might be considered controversial to some, a little outside of the self-help manual, yet when you live the journey you see how much sense they might make for you.

Ten Tips for Embracing Uncertainty
by Susan Jeffers, Ph.D.

There is no question that uncertainty…and worry…seem to have increased dramatically as we all try to cope with such concerns as mounting violence and the effects of the global economic crisis. Yet, there is no question that, with the right tools, all of us can rise above any situation that life hands us. Here are ten tools that might help you embrace uncertainty.

1. It’s All Happening Perfectly
Susan believed that, “No one knows the Grand Design, and the meaning and purpose of it all. To ease our minds and hearts we must embrace the thought that it is all happening perfectly.” This is a good affirmation to repeat throughout your day. It’s not always obvious at the moment what will come from what’s happening now. But trusting in this knowledge helps you to remain open and at ease rather than afraid. It reminds you that everything happens for a reason. If you are student of life you know that, whatever the results, you will find this to be true. Life conspires for your benefit. Keep this in mind and life will feel loving and much easier.

2. Use Procrastination
Sometimes it’s advisable to take a step back and think before you act. Procrastination can be a good tool to buy yourself some space. The answers to questions or problems are often found in your gut, not in your mind. When faced with a big decision especially, give yourself time to tune in and find the best answer. We are always in such a hurry, insisting on it now. You may not always be able to procrastinate, and it might not always be advisable, but listen to your heart to know if it’s appropriate. If you practice this enough, a moment to take a breath or two might be all you need to get in touch with your Higher self.

3. Collect Heroes
Find someone to emulate, and your path will become clearer. Other people’s inspiring stories keep you motivated and help you believe you can succeed. There are so many to pick from, and it’s so easy with the Internet these days to find out more about their lives. Susan suggested keeping a notebook of them along with what they gained from their experiences. She offered this thought about heroes, “If they can learn and grow from their experiences, I can certainly learn and grow from mine!” A collection of heroes gives you well-tested inspiration whenever it’s needed.

4. Be a Hedonist
The Merriam Webster dictionary defines hedonism as, “The doctrine that pleasure or happiness is the sole or chief good in life.” A wonderful thing to believe in! There’s not enough fun in this world. We all get so busy doing, doing, doing. Since there isn’t time to wallow in fun, you’ve got to do it with gusto and intention whenever you can. It feels good to fully enjoy yourself. All you have to do is choose it. Use the same determination you use to work, to have fun.

5. The Laughing Buddha
Sometimes a good laugh can change everything. The Laughing Buddha reminds you to allow the laugh to actively move through; to laugh with your whole body. The Laughing Buddha knows that, though life may seem chaotic, there is a Grand Design. You can make the world what you choose it to be. Funny movies and comedians awaken laughter, too. Try deliberately laughing, just for the sake of laughing. No matter what’s happening you can squeeze in a good laugh. Susan told us that, “Each time we behave like The Laughing Buddha, it shows us how to stay in the Highest part of who we are for longer and longer periods of time.”

6. Ask Wide Questions
This means asking questions with large answers like, “I wonder what will happen today?” Maybe it’s, “How can I be more loving?” “What might be motivating this person?” Questions with big answers that might not seem answerable leave room for a myriad of answers to come and open you up to a myriad of possibilities. Just tune in and listen for the answers!

7. The Power of Maybe
This, like the wide question, opens the possibilities for living and for learning. If you’re not sure all the time, you have what Buddhists call “beginner’s mind.” From this clean slate all things are possible. When you feel yourself being certain, take a step back and contemplate the world of “maybe”. All you have to do is add the word “maybe” to any statement of certainty such as, “I’ll love my new job … maybe” or “The president’s speech was right on … maybe.” This frees you from the bonds of certainty and allows many other pleasant scenarios to arise.

8. 50 Roses
Susan told a wonderful story of a friend who suggested her son buy 50 roses and give them to residents at a home for the elderly on Valentine’s Day. We can use the image without the actual roses. Giving an imaginary rose means giving love, doing something loving. This is a brilliant tool for finding ways to be more of service. Most of us want to give, but need a way to hold onto the intention. The image of giving 50 roses keeps you watching for ways to give them away. Susan said, “You will feel so good noticing the joy you bring to others that you will find enough roses to give away for the rest of your life.”

9. Scissors in the Mind
Here’s another imaginative game. Imagination is a marvelous tool that you can use at any time. The Scissors in the Mind is about imagining cutting the cord to whatever it is you’re holding onto. Often this is used to cut out the ties of expectation. It’s very simple. As soon as you notice yourself thinking the offending thought, close your eyes and imagine cutting the cord and the thought drifting out of your head. Susan suggested breathing a sigh of relief to help it on its way and prepare the mind for a new thought.

10. Act-As-If
Our minds don’t always know the difference between fact and fiction. You can see this when watching a movie; the adventure or drama accelerates and you can feel it though you know you’re not really there. What if you believed you really mattered in the world? You can start any question with the phrase, “What if …” such as, “What if … I was really important in this situation?’ or “What if … there was someone perfect out there for me?” Your answers would begin with the words, “I would…” thereby providing you with an instant to-do list showing you how to act-as-if in uncertain or scary situations. Susan explained, “As we consciously and patiently use the game of ‘act-as-if,’ we ultimately live into the awesome understanding of just how large a difference we can truly make.”

What Is The Secret To Getting What You Want?

It’s hard to go for what you truly want.

It’s hard on many different levels, but these three most easily come to mind.

First you must believe it’s possible.

As Napoleon Hill said, “whatever the mind of man can conceive and bring itself to believe, it can achieve.”  Or Henry Ford, “whether you think you can or cannot you’re right!”

Powerful ideas, right?

And that right there is the hardest step – believing it’s possible for you to get what you want.

It’s like this VP I met last week.  He’s an early promote, at every level of his career, young for his title, yet he wants to push for early promote to MD.  How can he do that?

Many people around him are wondering is it even possible to get promoted in this market, yet he’s saying, “I’ve done it my entire career, and if you’re willing to do what it takes, it’s still possible to get promoted early.”

He shall see.  That he’s willing to go for it is what counts.

But, importantly, what matters more is what he said in the middle of that sentence.  That’s the second hard part of getting what you want.  You must be willing to do what it takes.

And that is not easy.  Because to pull off something hard and get what you want can take extraordinary efforts.

Think about it.  Look at everything you’ve done just to get where you are today.  How much have you already had to do?

As he said, just to get here, he’s been putting in long hours for close to two decades.

He came from a dirt poor family.  As he puts it, “we didn’t have two penny’s, we were rubbing coke bottle tops together!”  Just to get to and through college required massive effort.  But, that was easy for him.  He had no choice.  He was willing to do what it took.

That landed him at the top of his class and then to a top job on Wall Street.

As you know, that’s where the hard work really began!

Throughout his career just to survive, let alone thrive, he’s had to do whatever it takes.  Long hours.  On and off planes.  Day and night voicemail.  Then, on top of that, going over and above, stepping up, doing more than he needed to keep getting ahead, stepping up at every level.

And going beyond that.

He’s a reader.

A learner.

He’s spent years reading the sorts of books that line my shelves, floors, hard drives, and every space in my place and mind.  Then, like feeding Godiva to a chocoholic, he said to me, “you have to grow if you want to get ahead.”  Amen!

That’s the third hard part of getting what you want.

It not only takes being willing to do what it takes, but it takes a willingness to grow and learn, to keep getting better and better if you want to get better and better results.

Doing all that is not easy.  But nothing of any value in life is ever easy.  That’s the point!

Usain Bolt is the fastest man in the world because every day he hits the track hard.  Anderson Silva is the best fighter in the world because he never stops.  Andy Murray became a world champ because Ivan Lendl took his training to an entirely different level.

None of that is easy, but if you love to grow and win, it’s not only worth it, it’s what makes your heart pump, what brings you alive.

It’s just like in our lives.  Think about your family.  Responsibility.  Your spouse.  Kids.  Financial obligations.  Commitments to something bigger than you.  None of that is easy.  But, it’s easy to do when it matters to you.

And that’s the secret to getting what you want.  When you want it so much, the effort feels easy, it’s just what you do because you love getting what you want!

Every Day Is A Saturday

I wonder if it will always be this way.

It’s so natural for me to just get up at 7.30 on a Saturday and start working.

I’ve  been doing that since I got serious about creating the life I truly wanted back in high school, and not much has changed from there.

I was an excellent student.  Not because I was super smart, I am smart enough, but because I was super diligent. Because I was in the library till it closed.  Or I was at home, ear plugs in, blocking out the noise of my rowdy family, working away until I was too tired to continue.

That served me well at Goldman too.  Some nights there was no too tired to continue, and I would still be sitting in my seat when the sun rose the next morning.

I wonder if it will always be this way for me?  Will I make different choices at some point?

My girlfriend isn’t so into it.  She says I work too much, that I need to take more time off, that there’s more to life than Do What You Want, there’s also enjoying having what you want.

And she’s right.  It’s a big part of what I practice and preach.  But, there’s something about it that she’ll never quite get.  It’s that for me doing my work is what I want.  It’s not about what my work gets me.  It’s not about getting paid or finishing it up, it’s that I am more engaged in doing my work than most people or things.

In the old days that was false.  In the old days I was driven by fear and the need to succeed.  In university that fear driving me making the difference between working full-time at KFC and landing at Goldman Sachs.  The same was true up until a few years ago.  Working around the clock, Wall Street by day, Do What I Want by night, but today its very different.

Today I just love what I do.  She wants me to be at brunch, but I tell her that people who have things more important they love to do ain’t sitting at brunch for a few hours.  And they certainly ain’t sitting at brunch, even with her sexy friends, yammering on what-ever sipping on a bloody mary.

Instead I like to work when I’m working and be doing what I want when I’m not.  I have zero interest sitting at brunch when I can be doing what I love.  And I have zero interest blowing away a couple hours on a Saturday morning because, as she says, “that’s just what people do.”

That’s because people can’t do that during the week, I tell her.  It’s their escape to be at brunch on a Saturday, but when you do what you want then, like one of my favorite movies says, Every Day Is A Saturday.  And while a couple hour brunch might be a good escape for her, skiing the entire season is more for me.

Doing what you want means doing what you want.  That is different things to all of us, I tell her.  She smiles. She doesn’t like it, she tells me she doesn’t know what she sees in me, but she does – she likes I do what I want.

Start The Day Write

sitting down to write is hard but I do it because it gets me what I want.

writing is like running.  even for people who love to run the first 10 minutes of the run might suck.

but, by continuing to run, they find their rhythm, they get into their zone, and like Forrest Gump they can just run and run forever from there.

writing I find is the same way.  getting myself into the flow of writing can be more painful than the wounds I get trying to cut Kat’s claws.

But, once I’m in the flow, it’s an amazing feeling from there.

Also, because it’s hard to get started, like running, it’s also easy to skip out.

it’s easy to find excuses to skip your run and the same is true with writing.  it’s easy to find reasons to avoid that initial part that sucks before you get in your flow.

so, an important part of writing, like running is to create the structure to Just Do It!  to discipline yourself to sit and create the habit to get in the flow

it’s like Stephen Pressfield created the voice for all writers when he talked about resistance and the importance of routine to get in the flow.

to just sit.  bum in the chair.  and write.  and do it whether it flows or not, it’s doing it that makes it flow.

there’s no easy way to do that.  it’s like reminding yourself you really oughta run.  if you want to resist it, how do you enforce it?

the key is to remind yourself of what you get from doing it and also ways to discipline yourself to do it – something I do for my clients and my trainers do for me.

but even that’s not enough when it’s time to sit you need more than other peoples reminders.  you need tools right in front of you.

like for me, in front of me is a sign that says – FULL ABSORPTION – reminding me to become fully absorbed in my writing.  and in my calendar, every morning, 8.00am, an alert pops up – START THE DAY WRITE!

What reminders can you use to help you keep doing what’s hard in getting what you want?

Are You Happy?

I used to hate that question.  It’s such a loaded question.  Like, if you answer yes, you are supposed to justify it.  And, if you answer, no, then you’re down some other path.  Either it’s about how that person can help you be happy or some other useless judgement about it.  So, it seemed to me you’re screwed either way.

Now I think about happiness quite different.  Having read all the books and thought about it for years I’m certain the entire idea of happiness is a joke.

It’s like one of my teachers says, people are more unhappy than they are happy.  It’s obvious from the looks on their faces and from what they talk about, but his point is something much more simple.  That it’s evident in the fact most people always want something.  And, as he says, if you’re happy, if you’re content, you don’t want anything, but when you’re unhappy that’s when you believe something will change that.

But, of course, we all know that is false.  Right?  Like, when did you last get something that made you happy forever?  It’s more like you get that quick shot of happiness, but like a double espresso, a few hours later you’re looking for your next shot.  So, it seems to me, you can keep going after more shots of happiness, or you can just stop all that nonsense and know that none of it will ever bring you happiness, because happiness comes from somewhere else.

It doesn’t come from meeting some man or woman.  Or from your team winning.  Or from that new car or dress or bag or house or job you think is that one thing that when you have it you’ll be happy, but instead it comes from you.  It comes from choice.  It comes from your decision to choose to fill your mind with ideas that make you feel happy right now.

I know that’s not always easy to see so instead I’ll give you an easier thing to do for happiness.  Just smile.  And laugh.  More.  At anything.  At everything.  At your problems.  At things you don’t want.  At things you do want.  At kids playing.  Birds flying.  Cats cleaning themselves with their tongues.  Just smile and laugh more.  Really.  At everything.  Anything.  Even if you fake smile and laugh you’ll feel happy, and at some point you’ll forget you’re faking it and you’ll catch yourself off guard being happy.

Phoning It In Or Answering The Call

 

When was the last time you set out to achieve a big goal?

A goal so big it mattered that much to you?  So big you didn’t know if you could achieve it?

So big that it required all of you, but even that would only get you a fraction of the way.  Like a body-builder setting his sights on Mr. Universe, that to achieve your goal you’d have to get much bigger?

When was the last time you set out to achieve a goal like that?  Was it recently?  Was it some time ago?

What drove you to set the goal to begin with?  What inspired you to keep moving towards it?  Were you like an Olympian dreaming of standing in the middle of the podium, gold medal slung around your neck?

Was it something different for you?  Did it relate to something personal, like my friend, a world class dancer, pushing herself to move better than before?

What was your goal about for you?  When you look back on it today, what do you notice about it?  What do you remember was so important to you along the way?

How did it feel when you were in the middle of it?  Did it feel like Churchill’s, “never never never never quit,” gritting your teeth to get through?  Like a marathon runner finishing the race with bleeding feet.  Did it hurt but you just had to finish what you started?

Or was it more like Tiger teeing off towards the 18th green?  Strokes ahead, the hard work behind you, knowing you just had to keep it together for a short time, the excitement building as you were taking your final steps?

Did you reach your goal or did it end in tears?  Was it like Humpty Dumpty, the fall breaking you, putting the pieces back together from there?   Did it all go up in flames?  How do you see from those ashes your phoenix did rise?

When was the last time you set your sights on a goal like that?  How much did it drive you that every morning you woke up with this feeling of coming alive?  How much did it lead you to grow?  What did you learn about yourself?  What goal did it enable you to set after that?  And after that?

What big goal are you chasing right now?  Are you going after what you truly want?  In your life?  Your career? In every way?  In any way?

Or are you phoning it in?  Is the phone even ringing?

Are you answering the call?

The Journey of a Thousand Miles Is Easier When You Fly

In the first blog post I wrote nearly three years ago I cited Chinese Philosopher,  Lao Tzu –

“A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step.”

Since then I’ve taken many steps, journeying in different directions, focusing on private clients, developing video and other content for Wall Street Teach, but this blog got left behind.

At the beginning I wrote consistently, but soon, while my well ran deep, my thirst to share ran dry.  “I wasn’t ready to share it, I was doing other things,” I might have told you, but truthfully, what I was creating I wasn’t yet able to share;  I stopped there.

They say 90% of the time the space shuttle hurtles towards the moon it is off course, meandering its way indirectly, but continuing to move towards its destination, for many of us that is how success will always be.

If you’re on a journey that’s worth taking you may not be able to see your destination from where you are but what matters is you keep taking steps towards what you can’t yet see.

Even then you might not arrive where you planned, in life there are no guarantees, yet as those on the journey know, it’s not the destination that defines what becomes of your life, it is the journey you take that shapes who you are to be.

Like all good stories circle back on itself, it was hearing the quote in this video that got me cracking on upgrading this site and getting me blogging again.  While many watch in wonder of those in Hollywood who took decades to become an over-night success, here you see two men whose stories inter-twine, and after many years and steps circle back in the end.

STOP Success Feeling Hard To You!

How does success feel to you?  If you’re like most of us it doesn’t feel much like success, but rather it just feels like one more toe hold as you make your way up the rock face trying to get to the top.

At least in that case you might be climbing for fun, but for many people, success is about getting somewhere.

But, there’s a problem with that – I’m yet to meet a successful person who was “there.”

Right?  Someone who said, “yep, I’m successful, I’m there, so I’m done.”

Because of course it doesn’t work that way, it’s more like degrees of happiness, where if you buy into the BS of the modern era you can always be more happy – which, of course implies that today you are less happy.  Wrong!

For those and many other reasons, if you’re like most of us, success feels hard.  It feels very hard.

And for good reason.

Wall Street is a very hard career.  You’re working around the clock. High stress. Tons of activity. Deadlines. Phone calls. E-mails. Always on.

And the same is true elsewhere.

All the time you hear from entrepreneurs that every day they motivate themselves by the fear of failure, telling themselves if they fail to make it work their wife will leave them, their kids will be relegated to public schools, and their career and life will have been a miserable failure.

Sure, those type of ideas can be powerful tools of motivation, but like working a chain gang, it feels hard and can also lead to early death.

And this problem extends far beyond the business-world, where it seems just trying to make it successfully through the day feels very hard for many.

Just look at our kids, they’ve got so much stress to perform we have them loaded up on Ritalin.  For mothers at home they’ve got them loaded up on wine, Prozac, weed, crack, and all sorts of drugs, if Katie Couric’s show on Mommy’s Little Helper is any indication, mommy’s are getting blazed just to make it through the day.

Look at the studies on stress and you see the same thing, that we have it so good, yet make it feel so bad is what leads to our heart attacks, high blood pressure – and ultimately early death.

Some might say, yep, “that’s just life in the modern era.”  BS, I say, if that’s life in the modern era then we have to change it.

That’s a win lose. That’s like saying to me, would you prefer to have your left arm or right leg amputated?  Um.  Neither!

So when it came to building Wall Street Teach, I make an important agreement with myself that if I was to make this happen, I’d have to go after it hard, I’d have to work at it as hard as any other time in my life BUT

I WANTED IT TO FEEL EASY.  I wanted to avoid success feeling as it had in the past, driving myself with fears, stressed out all the time, all that pressure and intensity constantly driving me like eight cups of coffee pumping through my veins.

Beyond a choice, it became a necessity for me, for to get my body to do the work I had to make an agreement with myself that it would never be that way again.

Instead, I wanted to do the hardest thing I’d ever done in my life, yet make it feel easy, effortless, exciting and fun.

So, how do you do that?

Sounds hard, right?

Well add this –

I wanted to do it without any substances.  No five cups of coffee just to get me going like I had to do working at Carlyle, just all natural human energy.  No work-hard play-hard, eighty hour weeks and three nights of binge drinking like I’d done in my early years at Goldman.  And no other drugs, uppers or downers, I’d experimented with over the years to give me that good feeling.

I wanted to do it and be free.  I wanted to be free of all the stress and free of all the substances.  I wanted to just feel that good everyday just being me, what I’ve come to call, get ready for it – FEELING GOOD.

Now, full disclosure I’m not there yet, even after three years working on it, I’m not quite there, but this has been so important to me that I’ve kept working at it.

In fact, this has been so important to me that I’ve designed a program to help you do it much faster, a program I call CHANGE YOUR MIND, which is designed to teach you to do all this in 30 days.

What that’s designed to do is train your mind to learn new ways of getting things done, such that you can do very hard things and make it feel easy, effortless, so you can WALK THROUGH THE WORLD WITH EASE.

Without going into any detail on this, let me share with you just one idea you can begin putting to work right away.

It relates to the way in which you motivate yourself, YOUR MOTIVATIONAL DIRECTION.

Now, here’s the thing to know on motivational direction.  You can be motivated in either one of two directions.  You can be motivated towards what you want, such as moving towards pleasure, or motivated away from what you don’t want, such as moving away from pain.

What’s powerful in this idea is once you understand how you are motivated in a certain context you can begin to change this in ways that feel the best.

For instance, when success feels hard, it’s typically because the motivational direction is away from, as is the case when an entrepreneur pushes themselves with the stressful and awful feeling of being terrified to fail.  Sure, it might be a strong motivator, but it’s an awful way to feel every day just to get yourself moving.

Or when a banker works all night doing a model because they have a stressful deadline coming up, which feels very different to staying up all night for the pleasure of doing a model!

So, what if you begin to change your motivational direction?  What if you could be motivated powerfully in the other direction, so that rather than being driven by awful feelings like stress and fear, imagine you could now be driven by powerful positive towards motivators like excitement and passion and enthusiasm and desire, all sorts of good feelings that make you feel better and better the closer you get towards your goal.

Again, this isn’t easy to do, this has taken me years to figure out, and years to program, yet simply putting to work this idea for many of my clients has been a cure from success feeling hard to success feeling so easy you might hardly believe it’s happening.

25% Of Bankers Think I’m Not Smoking Crack

At dinner with one of my friends and former bosses he told me that all of the bankers in his group had seen my videos.

So, naturally, I asked him, “what do they think?”

Now, not to be one to pull punches, and because we know  each other well, he just said to me, “well, it’s mixed.”

And waving his hands side to side like the French do when they use the phrase, “comme ci, comme ça,” he went on to say, that some of the bankers in his group think my work is very interesting and the rest think I’m smoking crack.

Who Does That?

Now.  Just for the record, truth be told, I’ve never smoked crack, but more than once I’ve heard the accusation…

And so I asked him, roughly, what percent of people do you think fall into the category of me not smoking crack?  He thought about it for a bit and then said, about 25% (although I think he was being generous).

And I tell you that felt pretty good to me.

That’s because for as long as I can remember almost all people I’ve met have thought my work to be pretty out there.  Not because my ideas are, they are of course very logical, but moreso because they tend to look at me like, “who does that?”

And they’re right!  Who does that?

Continue

Life Lessons From The Old-School

Who do you listen to?  One of my teacher’s likes to ask that question over and over again.  Who do you listen to?

In the world of personal development there are many so-called experts and gurus, yet over and over I come back to that question – who do you listen to?

For my money, rather than paying attention to the so-called new age experts, I find myself going back and reading and re-reading the old-school experts.

That means before you find me following some guru, you’ll find me going back to Benjamin Franklin.  And before I’m sitting reading another new book on the mind, you’ll find me re-reading Think and Grow Rich, learning again and again how history’s most successful greatest thinkers used their minds.

The same is true for me when it comes to Wall Street. So when people ask me who do I listen to on The Street, rarely do I think of the young, fast-money types, but rather I think of the old-school, those who’ve been around a long time, seen a lot of cycles, and have the perspective that only comes from decades of experience on The Street.

That’s why in catching up on a winter’s load of reading this piece from Byron Wien jumped out at me.  While I’m less into his mystical predictions of market and macro events, his Lessons Learned in his First 80 Years is one that grabbed my attention.

Here are some of the lessons I have learned in my first 80 years. I hope to continue to practice them in the next 80.

1.  Concentrate on finding a big idea that will make an impact on the people you want to influence.  The Ten Surprises, which I started doing in 1986, has been a defining product.  People all over the world are aware of it and identify me with it.  What they seem to like about it is that I put myself at risk by going on record with these events which I believe are probable and hold myself accountable at year-end.  If you want to be successful and live a long, stimulating life, keep yourself at risk intellectually all the time.

2.  Network intensely.  Luck plays a big role in life, and there is no better way to increase your luck than by knowing as many people as possible.  Nurture your network by sending articles, books and emails to people to show you’re thinking about them.  Write op-eds and thought pieces for major publications.  Organize discussion groups to bring your thoughtful friends together.

3.  When you meet someone new, treat that person as a friend.  Assume he or she is a winner and will become a positive force in your life.  Most people wait for others to prove their value.  Give them the benefit of the doubt from the start.  Occasionally you will be disappointed, but your network will broaden rapidly if you follow this path.

4.  Read all the time.  Don’t just do it because you’re curious about something, read actively.  Have a point of view before you start a book or article and see if what you think is confirmed or refuted by the author.  If you do that, you will read faster and comprehend more.

5.  Get enough sleep.  Seven hours will do until you’re sixty, eight from sixty to seventy, nine thereafter, which might include eight hours at night and a one-hour afternoon nap.

6.  Evolve.  Try to think of your life in phases so you can avoid a burn-out.  Do the numbers crunching in the early phase of your career.  Try developing concepts later on.  Stay at risk throughout the process.

7.  Travel extensively.  Try to get everywhere before you wear out.  Attempt to meet local interesting people where you travel and keep in contact with them throughout your life.  See them when you return to a place.

8.  When meeting someone new, try to find out what formative experience occurred in their lives before they were seventeen.  It is my belief that some important event in everyone’s youth has an influence on everything that occurs afterwards.

9.  On philanthropy my approach is to try to relieve pain rather than spread joy.  Music, theatre and art museums have many affluent supporters, give the best parties and can add to your social luster in a community.  They don’t need you.  Social service, hospitals and educational institutions can make the world a better place and help the disadvantaged make their way toward the American dream.

10.  Younger people are naturally insecure and tend to overplay their accomplishments.  Most people don’t become comfortable with who they are until they’re in their 40’s.  By that time they can underplay their achievements and become a nicer, more likeable person.  Try to get to that point as soon as you can.

11.  Take the time to give those who work for you a pat on the back when they do good work.  Most people are so focused on the next challenge that they fail to thank the people who support them.  It is important to do this.  It motivates and inspires people and encourages them to perform at a higher level.

12.  When someone extends a kindness to you write them a handwritten note, not    an e-mail.  Handwritten notes make an impact and are not quickly forgotten.

13.  At the beginning of every year think of ways you can do your job better than you have ever done it before.  Write them down and look at what you have set out for yourself when the year is over.

14.  The hard way is always the right way.  Never take shortcuts, except when driving home from the Hamptons.  Short-cuts can be construed as sloppiness, a career killer.

15.  Don’t try to be better than your competitors, try to be different.  There is always going to be someone smarter than you, but there may not be someone who is more imaginative.

16.  When seeking a career as you come out of school or making a job change, always take the job that looks like it will be the most enjoyable.  If it pays the most, you’re lucky.  If it doesn’t, take it anyway, I took a severe pay cut to take each of the two best jobs I’ve ever had, and they both turned out to be exceptionally rewarding financially.

17.  There is a perfect job out there for everyone.  Most people never find it.  Keep looking.  The goal of life is to be a happy person and the right job is essential to that.

18.  When your children are grown or if you have no children, always find someone younger to mentor.  It is very satisfying to help someone steer through life’s obstacles, and you’ll be surprised at how much you will learn in the process.

19.  Every year try doing something you have never done before that is totally out of your comfort zone.  It could be running a marathon, attending a conference that interests you on an off-beat subject that will be populated by people very different from your usual circle of associates and friends or traveling to an obscure destination alone.  This will add to the essential process of self-discovery.

20.  Never retire.  If you work forever, you can live forever.  I know there is an abundance of biological evidence against this theory, but I’m going with it anyway.

Want To Be Exceptional? Focus on Improvement, Continuously.

Although we can practice some things while we sleep, we don’t get good at any task over night.  Rather, the getting good at any task typically happens over time, through a process of refinement or continuous improvement. Although we often like to cite “overnight successes” and those “geniuses” who appear to develop skills or achieve great success over night, for the most part we generally accept that success and skill attainment happens over time.

While the phrase continuous improvement is heavily used in business, particularly in the manufacturing context, largely thanks to the Japanese, continuous improvement plays a major role in our everyday lives and everyday pursuits. Take for instance the sport that I spend a good time of my day right now pursuing, skiing.

Although it is the case that I get better at skiing every time I strap on my skis, in the same way I get better at dictating to Dragon every time I do that, that element of continuous improvement, let’s call it practice, is only a small part of the overall process of continuous improvement.  While practice is the most obvious form of continuous improvement, a process whereby we actually observe ourselves improving each time we do something, it is in effect the last phase of continuous improvement.

The first two phases of continuous improvement typically happen before we as individuals actually get involved. The first phase I’m just going to refer to as tools. The tools of continuous improvement are the equipment and, um, tools that are developed in order to pursue a specific task.  In manufacturing this would be the assembly line – thank you Henry Ford – and in skiing it would be planks of wood that I’ll be strapping to my feet in about an hour.  At this phase, continuous improvement is driven by human ingenuity and is evidenced in skiing by shorter, more powerful carving skis.

Sandwiched between tools and practice is what I’ll call technique. Along with the tools that are created to fulfill a task is the technique which is utilized in order to become exceptional at it.  From boxing to making out, it is the case with almost everything in life that technique is everything.  In skiing the techniques range from the pizza wedge that you first learn in order to stop yourself from hitting everything and everyone to full parallel skiing, the technique of skiing excellence.

The process of continuous improvement therefore is a process of development and refinement of tools and techniques as well as the continuous process of practice. Getting good at anything therefore, becoming truly exceptional at anything therefore, requires a process of continuous improvement at all three of those phases.  Now take a moment and observe a task in your life that you have the goal to become exceptional at. What other tools, techniques, and practices can you improve in order to become exceptional?

Improve Your Memories

It is said that at any one time the conscious mind can only retain seven plus or minus two bits of information.  This means that for most of us remembering a list of five items is relatively easy, seven items is a little more challenging, and nine items is likely quite difficult.  It is for this reason that if you already know the area code, remembering a phone number can be straight forward, but if you don’t, and the number is 10 digits, it can get tricky.

But of course that’s just one form of memory, conscious memory, short-term storage, the human equivalent of a computer’s RAM.  Our short-term memory, like the RAM of a computer is designed to fulfill a specific purpose, ultimately to remember that which is most important for us to remember right now.  It means that when more important information comes to mind that the less important information, like the area code of that phone number, is discarded.

Our long-term memory, however, the human equivalent of a computer’s permanent storage, the hard disk, is a different concept altogether.  As far as we know, unlike that hard disk that has a limited storage capacity, our long-term memory’s are thought to have limitless capacity.  This means that once information has been stored, it is stored indefinitely.  But unlike short-term memory which when stored is easy to recall (it’s only 5-9 bits), the challenge with long-term memory is being able to access that information when we need it.

Now.  While most of us understand these concepts too few of us are ever taught ways to utilize our memories. When we understand the basis of memory there are simple concepts that we can utilize to manage our minds. Based on this one principle alone – that our short- memories have limited capacity and our long-term memories are infinite – here are three simple concepts that you can utilize to improve your life.

  • Memory:  The trick to retaining short-term information is to convert it to a form that shifts the association to long-term memory.  For instance, simple memory tricks such as creating acronyms (e.g. NAMBLA) to remember a short-list or creating a linking list (or song) to say remember how many days are in each month or creating a list of memory pegs to attach to a list of items.  These are simple memory techniques you can easily learn and practice.  They’ll help you in your life and people will think you’re a genius.
  • Reading:  They say that three weeks after reading the average person recalls only five percent of a book. Why?  Because the average person reads in such a way that only a small portion of the book is ever processed from short-term to long-term memory.  Why?  Because memories are encoded according to interest and most people read so slowly that their minds get bored and wander.  You can get serious about improving your reading recall by learning to read (e.g. studying reading systems) or practice on your own simply by reading with intent, attention, focus, concentration.
  • Change work, changing behaviors:  Emotional trauma is often associated to events that we don’t remember consciously, but with timeless clarity we remember unconsciously in our long-term memories.  Take phobias, for instance.  While many of us are aware we are afraid of heights, elves, aliens, spiders, flying, etc. it is often the case that we don’t remember the event that led to the phobia. Why?  Because memories are not encoded according to events, but according to emotional associations with those events.  So, how do we change?  We can re-remember the event and bring the pain of the trauma back into our conscious minds, as traditional therapy might do, or we can make it easy and leave it unconscious and change the emotional association to the memory, as a hypnotist might do.

 

Mind Your Language. You Are What You Say

There are only a handful of Life Skills that really matter.  Personally I think the one that matters most is the skill to communicate with ourselves and others.  While many of us are familiar with the importance of inter-personal communications skills – my favorite resource – few people are as familiar with the importance of the way we communicate with ourselves.

As they say, you are what you eat.  You are also what and who you think you are.  And unfortunately when it comes to our own self, our perception often tends to be biased to the negative.  How often does a gilfriend or wife really ask if she looks fat?  Probably not very often.  But how often does she ask if she looks beautiful?  My guess is even less often.

Part of communicating with ourselves is to be conscious of the language we use and how it affects us.  They say that good liars are good liars because they ultimately convince themselves that their lies are the truth.  The same is true with our minds.  If we constantly tell ourselves we are not good enough, we will think we are not good enough, and we likely won’t be.  If we tell ourselves we can do anything, however, we just might.  Or at least we might try.  But how?

Some people give me crap about affirmations and visualizations.  I tell them to read Think and Grow Rich and Psycho-Cybernetics.  But while I swear by these tools, this type of daily practice requires some research and effort.  So for those who don’t want to put in the effort, I suggest a simple approach to monitoring your personal communications.  Every day in every way you talk – in your head, aloud, to others – pay attention and correct the language you use.  Here’s some simple things to look out for:

  • Language that inspires:  I can.  I will.  I do. I have.
  • Language that limits you:  I can’t. I never. I always. It’s just not me.
  • Negativity:  Do things suck or is your lens dirty?
  • Positivity:  Clean the lens and fewer things will suck.
  • Moving problems to the past:  My friend Ross taught me a technique to simply say “until recently I had [such a problem]…
  • Moving solutions to the future:  …but, with the resources I now have I am now creating the future [     ]
  • Emotional connections:  Pay attention to how it feels to use certain language (e.g. when you say “I’m stressed,” where do you notice the feeling?).  Say more of the things that feel good.

Gone In 60 Seconds

The Family Guy got me thinking about life and what happens at the end of it.

Not the end or where to from there, but the one minute right before all that.  If you could take your mind off the fact you only had 60 seconds left to live, what would you think about?

Would you consider where you’d been or where you were going? Would you think about you or other people? How would you feel about how you had used your time? Would you choose to ruminate on what you did or didn’t do?  Do you think you would feel good about your life?  Would it be 60 seconds of celebration or one minute wondering why you didn’t do more with your time?

Now think about the last 60 seconds, one hour, 24 hours, one week, two months, six months, one year, two years, five years, ten years.  Now, consider how you would evaluate how you’ve been living your life and using your time relative to how you would think about it if you were to be gone in 60 seconds.

Consider the parts of your life that you would cherish and wish you’d spent more time on.  Also consider the parts of your life that you would change if you could.  Then choose two of those.

Choose one part of your life that you cannot change, and use it to cultivate acceptance.  And, choose one other part of your life that you have now decided to change.

Then take another 60 seconds.  Write me and tell me what you came up with and how you’re going to change it.

Planning To Living

Part of what I endeavor to do is deconstruct life and develop practical frameworks for re-constructing YOUR life in order to live the life you truly want.  Today I’ve been writing about what I call a Directed Life.  It’s the term I use for building a life plan. 

But each time I get too technical about planning your life – life components, balance, sequencing, blah, blah, blah – I keep coming back to a simple trap of life.  A trap that the happiness literature clearly points out but each day many of us stumble into – that we don’t know what we want in the future.

In fact the research suggests that we aren’t even good at knowing what has made us happy in the past, let alone projecting what will make us happy in the future.  So the best we can do is know what makes us happy today and get this – look at what makes other people happy in their future. 

So when all this planning gets a little dense for me I remind myself that we never really know what we want.  And we certainly don’t know how we will feel about it in the future.  Then I tell myself that the best we can do is know what we want at each point in time.  Then figure out how to live it. 

So I’m going for a motorcycle ride.  I’ll figure out what I want in the future when I get back to it.  

Reality: There is No You. Just States of You.

In The Untethered Soul, Michael A. Singer writes, “Lao Tzu fell asleep and dreamt he was a butterfly. Upon awakening, he asked himself, ‘Am I a man who has just been dreaming that he was a butterfly, or a sleeping butterfly, now dreaming that he is a man?'”  It would seem the question is rhetorical; surely he is a man dreaming?  After all, we know he is a man, right?  Nope.  We’re just more likely to assume it because we know we too are human.  What if instead we knew we were butterflies dreaming we were human? 

I’m holding out that I may be from the future but I for one don’t think I’m a butterfly. My arms and perception of reality don’t stretch that far.  But the concept speaks to one aspect of the perception of reality – the observer of reality.  To who we are when we observe reality.  We are of course [perhaps] static, you are always you, I am always me, but the way we feel is not static, it is state-based.  That is, the way we feel changes based on our emotional state – sadness, anger, happiness, etc. – and therefore our perception of reality is also state-based.  

For instance, to most of us a blue pen is likely just a blue pen.  An instrument with which to write in blue ink. The reality is that it’s just a blue pen.  But what if you’d had a childhood that involved someone writing profanity up and down your arms in blue ink? The reality may be that it’s just a blue pen.  But to you, your emotional reality is likely quite different.  The sight of a blue pen likely changes your emotional state.  To you, it is likely more than just a blue pen.  

Similarly, if you showed up at a wedding a week after your own bitter divorce, you are probably far less likely to get into the emotional state of the wedding – love – than if you had arrived at the wedding a week after your own wedding.  Again, you are still at the same wedding, the reality of the wedding remains the same, but your perception of reality, your experience of the wedding, will likely be influenced by how you feel when you arrive – bitter from divorce or excited about marriage.

Both of these are examples of one of the five types of reality, Emotional.  The first example would suggest a deep emotional pattern associated with blue pens.  The second is more immediate – how we might experience the reality of a wedding based on how we feel a week after our own divorce or wedding.  Both examples highlight the role that our emotional state plays in our perception of reality. Said differently.  There is no such thing as reality.  Reality is state-based.  You are state-based.    

There’s a powerful conclusion from all this gibberish.  You may not be able to change your reality.  But if your perception of reality is state-based then you can change your perception of reality by changing your emotional state.  Put simply.  If you want a happy reality, choose a happy emotional state.  Easier said than done, right? Perhaps.  But said is the first step to done.  

Daily Reminders – What's Yours?

People often tell me that I live a fascinating life.  It’s strange to hear because to me it just feels like my life. It’s a response that speaks to the human trait of adaptability. Physically and mentally we are highly adaptable creatures.  As a species, we are able to adapt to almost any climate, food source, and raw materials necessary for surviving, and indeed in most cases, thriving.

As individuals, our bodies are highly adaptive.  Consider one simple example, walking.  The physical movement, the sense of footing and balance, the adjustments, etc. Each step an adaptive physical process we call walking.

Mentally we are even more adaptable.  Consider for instance the mind’s ability to affect physical performance, say through the activity of mental rehearsal.  In this case, a weight-lifter can’t think more muscle, but by harnessing his mind he can think more strength.  Mentally, we adapt all day every day – constantly processing new information, circumstances, decisions, people, thought processes, whatever.  Our minds and bodies are literally and physically continuously adapting.  

Adaptability has massive benefits but requires some Attention.  It’s this adaptability that enables humans to keep pushing forward.  As a species, it’s what got us from the farms to the factories and exploring the seas to exploring the galaxies.  As individuals, it’s what gets us from achieving our goals and resting on our laurels to choosing new goals and pushing forward – what took Eminem from Refill to Recovery.   Adaptability also helps us overcome adverse circumstances – deaths, failure, etc. – and to survive and thrive in a world of constant change.  But, the cost of all this wonderful adaptability often comes in our failure to appreciate what we have, when we have it.  

And what’s the point of all this pushing forward – as a species, as individuals – if we can’t appreciate what we have at each point in time that we have it?  From hot showers to iPods to freedom.  And what’s the point of all this adaptability if we don’t appreciate what we had to adapt for?  To grow. To achieve something. My life is fascinating because I have the time and financial flexibility to explore my passions.  I’ve adapted to it.  My daily reminder is to appreciate it.  What’s your daily reminder?

Stop Hating Your Job

Although it’s not always easy to change our jobs it’s always easy to change the way we think about them.

For instance, if you think of work as something you have to do, it will feel like an obligation, like something you don’t want to do.

Or if you think of it as “just a job,” then it will feel like just a job.  It will be just a job.  But it’s easy to change the way we think about our work.

What Ways?

Consider: Your work isn’t just a job.  It’s how you earn your income, how you support your life and perhaps the lives of others.  It is your livelihood.  

Or: Your work isn’t just a job.  It’s how you spend most of your days.  It is how you spend your time.

Or: Your work isn’t just a job.  It’s how you express yourself in the world.  It is who you are to yourself and others.

Or: Your work isn’t just a job.  That’s like saying your life is just a collection of hours.

No matter what job, you can think of it as you choose.

Look For What Is Good

I’ve seen this in my jobs from factory floors to Wall Street and read about it in books about happiness and Working.  The happiest folks in their work are not those with the “best” jobs.

They are the folks that choose to look for what is “best” in their jobs and to be happy in their work. A common example being janitors seeing themselves alongside doctors and nurses as part of overall patient care.

They say more than 65% of people are dissatisfied in their jobs.

I’d suggest that dissatisfied is a pretty lousy option when you have two perfectly good options. 

If we don’t like our jobs we can change them or change the way we think about them.  Each goes hand in hand.

When we stop thinking about hating our jobs we have more time to think about what we like about them and/or how to change them.    

There Is No Such Reality

Reality is experiential.  There’s no such thing as reality.  In fact I know of at least five types of reality.  My favorite to talk about is Attention.  That what we call reality, more specifically our perception of reality, is in fact the result of how we direct our attention.

For instance, surely you’ve heard somebody say something like, “now that I picked up my new car I’ve noticed them all over the road.”  Of course it may be true that their car has become popular but it’s more likely that their perception of reality has shifted based on attention.  They are now directing more attention to other cars that match the make, model, color, etc. of their new car.

A neat way to toy with the reality of Attention is music.  Consider a simple question:  when you listen to a song where do you direct your attention?  What do you listen to?  For instance, some people listen to the words and sing the lyrics, some tap their foot to the beat, some strum the air guitar, and some dorks air strum the upright bass.  Think about that for a moment.  What’s your reality when listening to music? What do you pay attention to?

As a singer I naturally direct my attention to the lyrics and more often than not sing along whether I know the lyrics or not.  My buddy Josh, who’s a drummer, listens to the back beat and plays air drums.  My mate Greig, who plays electric guitar directs his attention to the lead guitar and air strums the solo.  Another one of my friends, Jerry, who’s a composer, directs his attention to the structure and composition of the song.

So although the Physical reality is that the same song is being played from the same source, for each of us our reality of the song is based on which instrument and aspect of the song we direct our attention to.  Think about that for a moment.  Consider how many realities of the same song you can listen to by directing your attention between the different instruments, listening to each of them individually, as well as listening to the song as a collection of the individual instruments.

As with each song, so too the way we perceive the reality of our lives is a function of the reality of Attention. Imagine what that means.  It means that in all “instruments” of the song of our lives – work, relationships, hobbies, etc. – we can create an infinite number of realities simply by changing how we direct our attention.  Further, the reality of our lives is the collection of these instruments.  By directing our attention to each of them, and to the overall song, we can create an infinite number of realities in our lives.  Attention is a type of reality.  Are you paying Attention?

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