Preparing to Be Calm
Curbing my “intensity” has long been one of my personal/professionally growth goals and it is SO easy to fall for the “argue for your weakness…
Five Sure Fire Ways to Make Yourself Unhappy
1. Put Your Sense of Self-Worth into the hands of others. Never, ever let others define you or set your goals or priorities. “My Sense…
9 Questions to Raise Your Self-Awareness
1) When you have free time, what do you want to do? What takes no motivation for you to want to do it? 2) What…
Tell Me I’m Not Good Enough. Tell Me I Can’t. Tell Me You Don’t Think I’ve Got What It Takes. Please.
What motivates you? What puts fire in your belly? Fuels you? Stirs your blood? Failure defeats the mediocre but inspires winners to greater effort. The…
Difficult Conversations: How to Discuss What Matters Most
Difficult Conversations: How to Discuss What Matters Most by Douglas Stone, Bruce Patton, Sheila Heen (Part 1) Difficult conversations are anything that someone does not…
Upgrade Your “Attributional Style”
Assume the Best, NOT the Worst! Upgrade Your “Attributional style” Stuff Happens! Phone calls don’t always get answered or promptly returned, things do get forgotten.…
The Wisdom…and Challenge…of Asking for and Accepting Help
Many of us have a fierce streak of independence that makes it challenging to ask for help, heck even to accept help when it is…
Do You Know You?
There is very little difference between people BUT those little differences make a BIG difference. One difference is that those who create the life of…
How We Respond to Adversity Can Create Self-Fulfilling Prophecies
How do you view setbacks? As learning opportunity or as failure? Do you view your capabilities as fixed, somewhat set at birth, essentially carved in…
You Have Contributed to the Problem
Whatever challenges you are facing, odds are you had a hand in creating them. None of us are perfect; we all make mistakes, take wrong…
Do You Know Where Your Energy Goes?
Pay attention to your Energy Levels throughout your day; track what consumes your energy and what people, thoughts, and activities power you up. Start with…
Beware Your Reflexive Response!
Always choose a positive AND effective response. Does your response improve the situation? Move you toward your goals? Life happens in the sum of small…
Declining Drama’s Distraction
Drama can be incredibly alluring, attracting our attention, pulling us in with its siren song. The swirling emotions trigger our interest and emotions yet like…
Do You Have Negative Capability?
Negative Capability is “the willingness to embrace uncertainty, live with mystery, and make peace with ambiguity.” The phrase was first used by romantic poet John Keats,…
2018 Checklist: Characteristics of Success v. Failure
Failure Checklist Sense of Entitlement Watch TV Every Day Live in Denial/Deliberate Ignorance Think education ends with graduation Drift, Dream, Doze Off Cultivate Resentments, Hold…
Forget New Year’s Resolutions
Better a small promise kept than a larger one broken. Most New Year’s Resolutions fail because they are lofty goals with insufficient foundation. If it…
Dysfunctional Habits: Trapped By Your Triggers
Knowing your triggers, your short fuses, is crucial to learning and substituting new behavior. If you are not aware of (and alert for) what triggers…
Don’t Hear the Attack
Ah, we humans! We are sensitive creatures; highly reactive to criticism, quick to defend our egos, our territory, our self-esteem. Our quick triggers make us…
What Magnifies Your Spirit?
What lifts you? What thoughts leave a smile that lingers? What people make you light up when you see them? What experiences pull you up?…
Living the Question
I’ve spent my life looking for answers; burning curiosity about what makes things work the way they do, why the world is the way it…
How Could I Not?
The Parable of the Brothers: Two brothers were raised in a home headed by a violent alcoholic father. One brother grew up to be an…
The Fighter Within
What determines our fate? Perhaps it is Determination itself? One Hundred and Twenty-Nine Children were identified* as being “high risk for future problems, because they…
5 Predictors of Success
The Harvard Business Review Nov/Dec 2017 feature article was on “Launching Successful Leaders: How to Make Sure Your Most Promising People Reach Their Highest Potential”…
Six Emotional Enemies You Let Live Rent Free in Your Head
1) Fear: Fear is not real; it is an emotion we create in our minds based upon how we choose to interpret reality and predict…
Five Ways to Turn Disagreements into Diamonds
1) Frame it as a discussion, as a search for understanding and mutually acceptable solutions; never as conflict. There is a REASON for this person’s…
No Excuses Happiness
What are your criteria to be happy? Everything in your life going the way you want? Never going to happen or if it does, don’t…