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How to invite adventure and enjoy it

July 29, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Do you have something in your life that’s in the “I wonder if I’d EVER…” category?

We all need a bit of adventure now and then for the fully alive feeling of nervous excitement that it brings.

Adventure, of course, is relative. But well-chosen (if possible..we don’t always get to choose our adventures) and well-met, it always puts us in a position to grow in some way.

Your adventure may be climbing Mount Everest, traveling down the Amazon, or traversing the Sahara desert.

Adventure for me is a often a simpler thing.

It’s parasailing far above the water off Maui, jet skiing rapidly (and sometimes idling slowly) over the deepest part of deeply blue Lake Tahoe, or firewalking with adventuresome friends (who didn’t let me forget my promise to go with them the second time they firewalked, if they ever did).

You may show more guts and gumption when you clamp on the crampons to go mountain climbing than I do to jet ski.

Whatever your adventure is, there’s merit in it if it stretches and tests you in a positive way.

And remember, adventure doesn’t have to be a physical thing.

It can be testing yourself to see if you can write a book, speak in front of 500 people, bake an elaborate cake for a loved one’s birthday when the kitchen is an unfamiliar place for you, or rally a discouraged team to move far beyond past limitations in order to achieve far greater success than they expect.

With any adventure, there are stages you’ll face, and preparation you’ll need to do. Here are a few of the key stages you’ll move through:

1. Apprehension

Sometimes adventures are best experienced without a lot of preparation. That means you don’t have a lot of time to get nervous.

And sometimes a little apprehension can be a good thing because it motivates you to plan and prepare more thoroughly, reducing the risk of the experience.

2. Preparation

This includes mental preparation: mentally rehearsing, imagining yourself being confident and successful even if not always comfortable in the unusual circumstances you’re putting yourself into, willingly.

Preparation also includes physical readiness, such as lifting weights, building up endurance, eating the right foods, drinking plenty of water, getting enough sleep.

3. Figuring out your backup plan

Along with rehearsing for success, create a backup plan in case something goes wrong.

For example, with whom, and how will you communicate with your support crew, if you have one? How will you reach an emergency crew if there’s equipment failure or an injury?

What will you do if some essential step in your plan doesn’t work, and you have to adapt, innovate, or in other ways accommodate circumstances you find yourself in?

You can’t know for sure what will happen, but you can pre-think without dwelling on the downside of what could happen. If you’re prepared, you’re more likely to handle contingencies well.

4. Doing everything you can to ensure safety in the experience

Do your research. Plan. Enjoy the preparation. Learn from others who’ve done this before. Take the necessary precautions: train, buy the right equipment, make sure you have health insurance.

Sign the waivers.

And then…

5. Trust yourself

You’re testing yourself AND treating yourself by taking part in this experience.

You’ve done adventurous things before, and you will again.

You can do this, too.

Just think of the great story you’re living and creating, and the experience you’ll have to look back on for the next big challenge that comes along.

6. Be in the moment

You’re paying for the moment, whether that’s through participation fees you paid or equipment or training you bought.

You’ve also spent time planning and preparing, and have foregone other opportunities in order to do this.

Be here now, completely.

Fully experience the experience.

Enjoy it as much and as soon as possible. Fear will give way to exhilaration and pride.

7. Know what the end of the experience is likely to look like…even if you don’t know what it will feel like

Just knowing what the end of the experience may be like will give you a bit of an endgame, a destination, a reference point.

If this adventure is a big one, you won’t know how you’ll feel, or how you will have been changed by the experience until it’s done.

Soon it will be over. You may find then that you wish the once fearful adventure could have gone on and on.

And what does that mean, ultimately?

You’ll just have to start planning for the next scary-exciting experience as soon as this one is done.

Filed Under: Leadership, Musings, People watching

Taking a big risk

July 18, 2010 By Leave a Comment


28/52 summer evenings with Cisco
Originally uploaded by Ciscolo

Sometimes there’s a risk you’re not quite ready for, even as your excitement grows about the challenge just ahead.

In this scene, a golden retriever puppy seems to see the top of the hay bale as a safe place to pause before taking on that next big step.

What was the latest experience you had like that?

It was a time when you paused for just a bit and excitement built, soon overtaking any fear you had about that next big step.

Let the lessons of that experience help you now if you’re facing the challenge of a soon-to-be-taken big and unfamiliar step.

Filed Under: Images, Musings, People watching

Do you need to remodel…your self-image?

July 6, 2010 By Leave a Comment

When you’re making significant change of any type, you typically find many barriers along the road.

For many people, though, a major barrier to change is the person’s now-out-of-date self-image.

Your expectation of your ability to change has a lot to do with how hard change will be for you, and if you can sustain it.

If you don’t update your self-image as you make progress through life, like it or not, you’re more likely to slip back into old ways – almost like snapping back to a picture or pattern you’re trying hard to fit that you’ve long ago outgrown.

For example, perhaps you think of yourself as the quiet kid you once were when you felt buried in an older sibling’s shadow.

Yet perhaps others would be surprised if they knew that image you held of you.

That’s because they see a confident, outgoing person who’s easy to talk to, comfortable in the company of anyone they meet, and in any social situation.

You see the point. You may be carrying around a very out-of-date sense of yourself, and it can definitely hold you back.

Take some time at least once a year to catch up with yourself.

Here are a few ways you can do this:

1. Check in.

Take some quiet time to check in with yourself.

Find a place and time when you can really listen to the quiet voice inside, and get your honest answers to such questions as these:

- How you feel about how things are going?
- What challenges have you overcome recently?
- What are you most thankful for at this point in your life?
- What are you proudest of now?
- What are the main things ahead in your life? How do yo feel about them?
- Are there ways you can add simple things to look forward to, if you don’t see a lot of them ahead?

2. Look at.

Take a picture of yourself, or have a friend take one for you. Or choose a recent photo of yourself that you like.

Include the photo with some of these other things you’re thinking about, jotting down, or gathering to help you get a current sense of who you are now.

3. Look out.

Notice who’s in your life now.

- What relationships do you cherish most now?

Are the relationships you miss?

What relationships would you like to create, or let into your life now?

5. Listen.

Ask a few people who are very important to you what you do that means the most to them.

Then exchange the favor. Share your thoughts and feelings about the impact they have in your life.

6. Refresh your dreams.

Look at your dreams of things you’d like to have, do or become.

- What dreams have you already achieved?

- What dreams do you want to hold onto?

- What dreams do you want to refresh?

- What dreams are you ready to let go of because they really no longer fit?

7. Record.

Capture a few thoughts, ideas, pictures, drawings, doodles or symbols of this time in your life that you want to save.

Save them in a scrapbook, notebook, or memory box if that’s were you keep special things.

Someday the self-image you’re remodeling now will be out of date again.

Who knows how you’ll change by the next time you do a “self-image refresh?”

8. Celebrate you.

Now, take the time to celebrate you, as you are now.

Do something that you really love, but rarely do, whatever it is that seems like an appropriate and current celebration of who you are now, on your way to becoming the person you will be, the next time you do a self-image refresh.

Accept and celebrate the best. Accept the parts you want to change, as well, and above all, be patient with yourself.

Enjoy the journey!

Filed Under: Musings, People at Work

Thinking spot

July 5, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Thinking spot
Originally uploaded by jcgr

You’ve probably heard the brainstorming exercise where you imagine being in one of your favorite places in the world to get great new ideas.

Well, whether it’s real or virtual, the beach in Carmel is one of the places I go for good thinking time.

A little beautiful blue scenery, the sounds and fragrance of the ocean, a little sand between my toes, finding a pretty shell or two…for me, it’s a spot of heaven on earth.

On this day, I’d taken a sandwich, coffee, and a book I’m in the final stages of writing so I could do a little work oceanside.

Somehow, it always works.

Where’s your favorite, accessible, it-always-works-somehow thinking spot?

Filed Under: Images, People at Work, Serendipity

How to keep your focus in the face of daily distractions

July 4, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Are you trying to improve your long-term focus in the face of a steady flow of possible distractions?

If so, begin the day with five quiet minutes.

Those five little minutes can go a long way toward helping you keep the activities of the day focused and leading you to long-term goals, instead of finding at some point you’ve inexplicably been led away from them.

In this preview of the day, look at your anticipated activities in light of your long-term vision, dreams and goals.

Ask yourself these two questions:

- What’s the main business of my work today?

- What’s the most important thing for me to do, even if it means I don’t complete anything else?

Then use the answers that emerge to help you keep your eyes on the prize of that day in the context of the dreams for your life.

Otherwise?

It’s easy to be pulled into urgencies, short-term dilemmas and would-be dramas.

And so, with your long-term vision and goals in mind, here are other things you can ask yourself, imagining a successful day, as you do:

- What can I do today that takes me closer to my vision?

- What challenges am I likely to face? Knowing what I know now, how can I most easily handle them?

- What distractions might I face, and what will I do when I encounter them?

- What opportunities might I experience, and how can I make good use of them?

- What work is on the list that I don’t want to do, but must? (Imagine yourself doing these things easily, effortlessly – just getting them done and crossing them off the list rather than carrying them around with you to continue to weight down the to-do list).

Keep your eye on the prize, and make today’s actions count toward your long-term vision.

If you don’t have one, here’s one way to create the big-picture plan you can use to frame five-minute preview of each day:

1. Know what your dream or long-term vision is, or make the time sometime soon to let it become clear.

2. Make your vision tangible. Imagine having achieved it, and notice what you see, hear, feel, think in that situation.

3. Find a symbol that represents your dream or vision. Keep that symbol around you to regularly remind you of it.

4. Set interim goals and do the work that lead you to your long-term goal.

5. Pay attention to the progress you make so that you reinforce and build on it.

6. Create rewards and give them to yourself for reaching your interim goals.

7.  Move things out, let go, to make space for new things in your life.

8. Create a simple storyboard to capture the story of your progress as it builds, helping you to see the growing flow of change.

Filed Under: Business Results, People at Work

The power of a fresh perspective

July 4, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Bokeh Bokeh
Originally uploaded by Matt-Richards

Sometimes all it takes is a slight shift in perspective to see the beauty of the moment, a new idea, or have a fresh appreciation of what you have before it goes away.

Here the lights of the gathering night reflect off a windshield and sparkle in the distance of the waning day.

What fresh perspective could help you see something in a new and, perhaps, better way?

Filed Under: Images, Musings, People at Work, Serendipity

Checking with customers? Don’t forget the most important ones

July 1, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Checking in with your customers is always a good idea when you’re trying to improve productivity and effectiveness in your work life.

Don’t forget to check in with some of your other important customers, too, the most important ones.

Check in with the people in your personal life.

They want and deserve your time, more, in fact, than anyone.

And you may think you know, but you may have no idea what impact your job is actually having on the people you care most about, and who care the most about you.

Don’t take them, or their good will for granted.

Similarly, make sure they know your needs, and how things are going, too.

You deserve their full attention some of the time, too.

And if there’s some problem you didn’t know about, there’s always something you can do to improve this most important part of your life, too.

Relationships of all types take good intentions, attention, caring, sharing, creativity and time.

If you’re a parent, for example, an extra hour spent perfecting a PowerPoint presentation probably won’t make nearly as much difference in the long run as will that same hour and attention spent at your child’s soccer game, attending their science fair, sharing a laugh, a long walk, or making time for a good talk.

If you’re always focusing on efficiency, and carving up the to-do list to make sure it all gets done on time, by someone, share errands.

Go grocery shopping and cook together, take a long walk or drive.

Sometimes, be inefficient, by design.

Sometimes the highest priority is creating a way to share and catch up. And by definition, that sometimes means you don’t divide up all the tasks.

Change the roles, even for a bit.

If you normally lead (or drive), volunteer to navigate, or take the back seat.

Let someone else decide what or where you’ll eat.

Let someone else decide how to get the work done, and choose the standards you’ll work to.

Or if you’re the one always taking the back seat, take the lead, with all the pluses and minuses it brings. (Sometimes taking the lead isn’t much fun).

In some ways, at some times, seeming inefficiency is perfect for both the short- and long-run.

Check in with the most important people in your life. Ask them, at a minimum, such customer-focusing questions as these:

- How are we doing?

- Where can I, and we, improve?

- What am I, and are we, doing well?

Listen with an open heart, an open mind. Leave space and time for whatever you’re hearing to be there, to be heard, to sink in.

Don’t rush to fill the silence with, “Yes, but…” responses, or “At least I try!” defenses.

Just listen.

And share.


Filed Under: Customer Focus, Leadership, Musings, People watching, Serendipity