Monthly Archives: January 2018

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

If the box fits

Leave a comment

For most, our daily lives are framed by constraints.  For example, you  get up at specific times based on committments  or perhaps lack thereof.  You go to bed based on the constraint of when you are getting up.

This framework can form a box (metaphorically speaking) which you comfortably fit into.  The question is, just because the box fits, should you wear it?

Personal Satisfaction/Enjoyment

Routine can be relaxing and followed with ease, in short comfortable.  It might not be the best approach to maximizing your personal pleasure even if it is probably the easiest path to follow.

Going to bed at different hours , changing up your travel routine, trying different daily activities are more likely to challenge you and psychology studies indicate stepping out of the box and mixing it up increases the  probability of self satisfaction (albeit the studies seem to employ somewhat subjective measures.).

Breaking Out

Extreme practices, for example consistently stretching or breaking the box that surrounds you is not being recommended.  As with most things a judicous balanced approach is most likely best.

That is some combination of routine and impulsive behaviour, is more likely to  result in making you feel better over time.

Consistent routine might result in lost opportunities to accelerate your personal pleasure while an reckless approach might be invigorating it could be too stressful.

Give it some concious thought, break away from the unconcious routine, to some extent and check the results. You might surprise yourself.

 

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Complications

Leave a comment

Complications arise when circumstances create an obstacle, require effort to hurdle through and move ahead or a problem arises that appears difficult to resolve .

I wonder how much of these complication are in fact of our own making.  In our head, so to speak, we devise problems that don’t exist.

To some degree I have observed others devise and communicate complications during a team collaboration, a behaviour I suspect is largely a way to gain recognition and be percieved as important.

Without Accountability

One of my greatest frustrations is when individuals are participating in a meeting,  or other collaborative activity, without clear purpose or accountability.

In these case the temptation for them to create complications simply to justify their presence is high.  What a waste of both everyones effort and of course efficiency and effectiveness fly out the window.

Hidden Agenda

Less frequent but just as frustrating are those occassions when someone raises complications just to be purposely disruptive.  These cases are usually motivated by some hidden agenda (e.g., derail the work, stop a change from occuring and so on)

Relax, Coast on Thru

Frustration, anger, paying attention to these silly complications in any way just feeds the disruptors motive.  Firm, polite facilitation toward the goal (which is was clearly stated up front) is a great mitigator of those who complicate.

I frequently find other participants readily support going back on track.  By not paying attention or getting hooked by extraneous and unecessary complications you will find the odds of achieving your objective rise significantly.

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Stating the Obvious

Leave a comment

Sometimes the iceberg is right in front of us and like the Titanic we plow ahead anyway.  The sudden collision is a pretty good indicator we missed something, sadly like the Titanic it might be too late.

The obvious can often only be understood when you conciously observe and process it.  Often we simply track on the expected and might roll with the obvious, roll over it or miss the opportunity presented entirely.

Philosophically speaking

Philosophers have been known to categorize the discipline as the study of the obvious.  This of course can lead to the obvious question, why study the obvious which  by definition is easily perceived or understood; clear, self-evident, or apparent.

Maybe not always so.  This is the aspect of the obvious recognized by philosophers.  While the information might be easily digested,  it is similarly easily misunderstood or overlooked.

One key to philosophical analysis is not the statement of the obvious but rather unearthing the oppotunities associated with things we generally percieve unconciously and so do not reap the full benefit.

For Example

Consider the obvious comment “You are more likely to achieve sustainable long term goals through a carefully planned, reasoned approach”.

Over the years I have shared that thought with many friends and colleagues to derisory feedback like “duh”, “tell me something I did not know”.

Yet the frequency I have observed others behaving exactly contrary are numerous.  Demanding, threatening, unplanned spur of the moment reactionary behaviour has been far more common.  This could of course just be my own bad fortune but I don’t think so.

The next time the obvious occurs to you, pause, think it through fully.  Use it before just letting it pass without benefit to yourself.

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Play the game for yourself

Leave a comment

Showing up and participating might get you a pass but if you want to win more is needed.  Viewing life as a game (yes, a tired and worn out analogy) places your role as a competitor.

Being part of the play can be very enjoyable.  I wonder though if something is missing.  If we equate success to winning, achieving your goal (i.e., success) should be a win.

Just being not enough

If your objective is just to show up, it probably is not a real objective and probably is not enough.  Building on the game analogy my suggestion is to study the rules, players and potential outcomes.

Based on this analysis, as your goal pick an outcome that will maximize your enjoyment, without negatively impacting others.  Don’t kid yourself, maximizing your enjoyment requires more than just showing up.

A servicable performance should never be taken as a complement.  The feeling of real accomplishment is like a stimulating drug, it feels good.  That is just basic human nature.

Play to win every time

The very key to the ideas proposed in this post is repeatable consistent behavior.  Whatever the activity of the moment never mail it in.  This is of little benefit to yourself.

Seize every moment with gusto, not unfocused energy but rather excitement and purpose.  I cannot think of any occassion when just going with  current is a worthwhile approach.

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Surprise!

Leave a comment

The catch all definition for a surprise is “an unexpected or astonishing event.”    This is a bit simplistic because the magnitude of surprise can vary depending on how impactful the event is, whether is negative or positive and how unexpected it was. (But they all are surprises)

For example, the people living in earthquake prone geographic regions will express surprise when an earthquake occurs, even though it is not truly unexpected.

The moment in time, the magnitude of the earthquake and the results can be somewhat predicted but not with pin point accuracy and the surprise people feel at time of occurance is not unexpected in that context.

Ignore and Hope

Old age is more likely to produce strokes, heart attacks and other negative impacts.  Yet, for many, the signs are ignored to some extent and hopeful ignorance reigns supreme (I will live a long time).  When the physical event occurs it is often a surprise (to some degree anyway).

Wishing negative surprises do not occur is a very natural human behaviour and can be a good stress reliever.  Why worry about something that might occur?  Better to assume it will not.

Pragmatically for the inevitable negative surprises that will come our way acting like an ostrich has some merit  (e.g., death and taxes – although some are not surprised by their taxes).

Predict or Accept

An interesting question for me around the approach to surprises is should we try to predict and worry or just accept them when they occur and move on.

Clearly there is probably not an absolute here.   On one hand, worry can lead to mitigation and real avoidance but it can be unpleasant as well.  On the other hand, acceptance is not always easy to do.

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Writing your obituary

Leave a comment

Sometimes people tell me I seem very content.  A long time ago I read about a cool way to measure your personal contentment.  Draft your obituary.

Every few years, or sometimes more often, I write down what I think people would say about me.  Of course this is deeply personal and I never share it or discuss the content with others.

The exercise focuses on what you think about yourself.  Not surprisingly, most people are their own harshest critics.   Self assessment can be a valuable to to check how successful you are.

If you don’t have a positive feeling about your life , both lived and to be lived it’s unlikely others would.

Checking How you feel about yourself

The draft obituary is a great tool for a personal checkin.  The content accentuates the positive (few people write obituaries a about a dead persons failings.).

The narrative is objective and factual to a point, that is history, career and acomplishments are based on events.  The subjective portion, for example, “he was loved by his children” is indicative.

Usually you would omit those types of subjective comments if they did not have a ring of truth.   So ultimately the obituary you draft about yourself is really a reflection of how you view yourself.

Things you identify that you don ‘t like about yourself you can change and the other things make you feel good about yourself.

Give it a whirl, better than even a personal massage.

keyboards

Conscious Thought

Leave a comment

Conscious thought requires more effort than unconcious thought.  It is theorized that one possible cause of autism is a persons inability to think unconciously.

While most people can behave in an autonomic  way for many routine actions it’s thought those inflicted with autism have to think through eveything in a conscious way.

The danger of Unconcious thought

In theory, being able to rely on predefined soltions to external behavioural clues allows us to focus on the important things directly and conciously.

Those things that require analysis and thought to arrive at informed conclusions, and subsequently, leading to  appropriate behaviour are best handled consciously.

Think about the scenario first thing in the morning.  You begin to encounter other people and mainly great them with a “good morning”.

This is a typical sub conscious behaviour.  Somewhere in your store of unconscious behaviours is a routine grreeting to use in the morning even when it is not reflective of reality.

How often have you muttered good morning to others when in reality for you it was anything but.  People with autism will usually think consciously what their morning  greeting should be and then say it.  Many of us find this disconcerting.

And so that highlights both the benefit and danger of unconscious autonomic behaviours.  They may not really be appropriate because they are based on a pre-defined action and so they could be off putting to some or result in truly inappropriate behaviour.

Of course acting conciously when a routine action is expected could be unnerving as well.  On the whole though acting consciously is more likely to be both supportable (you had a well thought out reason) and the outcomes will often be better.

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Failure is a choice

Leave a comment

Lack of personal success can be a result of many factors.  The things that impact success, or the level of success, that are within your control, are exercised by your own determination.

Failure is defined as a lack of success.  To what degree success is not achieved can be largely subjective; However, ultimately, for the aspects within your control the decision to succeed or not lies with you.

Of course the determination of whether the results represent an acceptable level of accomplishment depend on subjective analysis, both yours and others.

Deciding to Succeed

If you decide not to succeed does that equate to deciding to fail?  My own thought is yes.  While failure can arise due to factors outside your control it is just as likely to occur because you gave up.

In the second Star Wars movie (episode v) the character Yoda states this in a very simple way.   “Do or do not, there is no try.”   If you try there is a conscious acknowledgement a goal is being attempted and you may succeed or fail.

In fact, the decision to succeed requires you to believe in success.  You don’t try, rather you just do.  The things outside of your control willrestrict your ability to do things within the realm of the possible, the things within your control won’t.

Trying restricts your success not only to the realm of the possible but also to your own decision to proceed or give up, “I tried but could not do it.”

Doing and not succeeding is always about factors outside your control.  An extreme example of this for illustrative purposes would be to enter a room without opening the door.

Most likely all you do to  get through the door would fail, not because of what you did, but rather because the door was stronger than you.

Succeed more often than failing by deciding that is what you want.

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Seeing Answers

Leave a comment

Our lives are a series of events.  We get to choose how to interact with, embrace or even ignore these occurrences.  And of course we can create them as well as just being a passenger along for the ride.

How you percieve the things that impact you, including those that are self initiated, is usually either optimistic or pessimistic or some balance of these two extremes.

Optimism

This is a preconceived belief in a successful outcome.  Your perspective focuses on solutions, that is sucessful outcomes.  What answer, when applied to this event will result in success.

Of coures this approach relies on your awareness of what answers support your goals and objectives.  Your own happiness and pleasure can be achieved only if you know what you seek (the answer).

Pessimism

Your perspective leans toward believing the worse will happen and your confidence in the future is low or non existant.  This is a choice that can reduce disappointment but it diminishes the opportunity for enjoyment and pleasure.

Positive Attitude

As commented in a recent post, attitude equals behaviour.  Your behaviour, ( how you act) defines you.  Simply put, a slight varience on the old saying “you are what you eat” becomes “you are what you do”.  This accurately depicts how others decide how to percieve us, it is based on behaviour.

Optimistic approaches to everything you encounter forces a positive attitude leading to exemplary behaviour and voila you are a star.

Random thoughts – keeping you on your toes

Achieving clearly understood, cost effective, quality products and services

Leave a comment

Many distain process and governance as bureaucratic practices which have more cons associated with them then pros.  This could not be farther from reality.  It is very dependent on your perspective.

Organizations, even households have a common generic objective.  That is to provide clarity to all stakeholders  (e.g., employees, volunteers or family members) so outcomes are cost effective and high quality.

Processes are:

Through the practice of simple, repeatable, well communicated and easily understood steps, the results will be consistent (repeatable), and assuming the practices are designed to be easy (cost effective) and of course the activities are formulated to ensure the highest quality.

The combination of executing  multiple practices or steps becomes the process.  By following a process everyone is clear on what to do, or what they get or how to get it.

The outcomes ( product of the process) are therefore never a surprise and since, clarity is practiced throughout, problems which may arise are identified early on and so can be resolved before they become too impactful.

In the Real World

MacDonalds operates a hugely successful restaurant business.  Their success is soundly based on consistent, repeatable, clearly communicated and understood processes.

When you go to MacDonalds you know upfront what you can get (consistently every time, anywhere in the world) when, how and at a low cost.

The companies sales and ongoing longevity are pretty good indicators that their seemless execution of well defined processes works.

So if you think process is a bad word, if you have visions of bureaucratic slowness and wasted effort on unnecessary tasks, get over it, processes are a powerful way to guarantee you can reach the  objective.