Forever missed appointments

Forever missed appointments

I am currently sitting here waiting for my noon gig, alone, again. This is actually the fourth time this week that something has gone awry in a schedule mdeeting. In fact, I have had a 100% failure rate so far this week. Hours and hours and hours of waiting, but no actual connects yet. And its Thursday already even!! Monday was a fail, Tuesday was a fail, last night was a fail, and so far today is a fail. No one is really to blame yet, things have been beyond every person's control. How can I be a person who is unfailingly optimistic even when scheduled work is failing. Well . . . try try again.

And surprise surprise here comes half of my noon appointment. Patience, waiting for the important pieces to fall into place. Great meeting! Success!

They are only forever missed appointments if you fail to reschedule and reschedule.

Value creation

Value creation 

The best question I ever discovered to push me to be more is "what value am I providing in this situation?" There is basically an infinite number of things you and I could be doing. Unlimited actions we could be taking. But the important ones are the ones that create value for you, your work, your customer, your organization, your client, your family, your God.

Issac Morehouse says " . . . focus on value creation, no matter how humble." He continues, "You are your best investment. There is no IRA, real estate deal, savings account, or job that will come close to generating the returns you get when you invest in enhancing your own value to yourself and others."

This is the most important contribution we can make. It is the way to do the important, the critical, the significant, the meaningful and the very best gift we can give to ourselves and others. I don't know what you are creating, but as Morehouse said, the best returns are on value creation. You are your best investment ever.

Airplane communications

Airplane communications

This is means bad. I observed that on my two flights today that I might have heard and understood three out of 36 messages over the PA systems. When your communication system and or process is poorly done, or the equipment fails to help you give clear and concise messages, then it is just noise that everyone automatically filters out. The brain is designed that way it seems to me. 

I am paying attention to these matters more nowadays because I have been challenged to tighten up my communications. While I don't use an aircrafts PA system, my tools may be just as poorly implemented. Not only are the voice communications ignored, but also the signs employed on the aircraft because they often are not current. Like the fasten seatbelt sign is still lit even though all the staff are moving around the cabin. While there may be rough flying in the next few minutes, no one believes it because the cabin crew is braving it. I understand there may be different standards and rules of conduct between staff and customers, this particular customer needs to go to the bathroom. But I abhor breaking the rules, especially when I might regret it, even though I probably wouldn't.

Communication has to mean something if you want folks to pay attention and follow along. Communication has to be understandable in order to be viable. Just because you said the words out loud into the PA system and that may free you from some legal liability, it accomplishes nothing, if you can't clear say the words in one of the four or five languages I can follow.                                                                                                                                                                                                   

A cockroach in my grits

A cockroach in my grits

There are weeks in my life that I would rather forget. This week has been one of those in part. In "part", because there have also been some spectacular wonderful moments as well. But overall, it has been a cockroach in my grits. 

I use that particular metaphor because of the spectacular cockroach (if spectacularness is measure in size alone) I saw the morning the whole mess of the week began. 

So I have practiced over and over and over again, changing the narrative, changing the story I am telling myself about what is happening and why and what choices I have about what is happening to me (because in the end that is the only choice we have most times, and it certainly is the only thing we can control - our response), and then I even moved it up a level to changing the lens - not just the story I was telling myself, but moving (metaphorically) into a different seat, a different point of view, a position that varies from the one I think I am stuck in - and still the injuries mounted.

It has spiraled to the point that I am a little wary of even flying these flights today, even though honestly I am not superstitious, . . . really . . . seriously, I am not.

Perhaps all that is left to do is throw the whole lot out and start a fresh batch of grits? If the plane doesn't go down in flames, I think I will. Let's start by counting all the things I can be grateful for . . . and so it begins.

You really took my scissors?

You really took my scissors?

Seriously? I have always experienced that the smaller the airport, the more anal the scrutiny and abuses. Those scissors have literally flown 100's of flights, passed through 100's of security checks, been touched and handled and ultimately passed by 1000's of security personnel in airports all over the entire planet. You were just too damn lazy to even look at them, see their blunt tips, see how impossible they were to use as a weapon. In fact if I _could_ have used them as a weapon I would have stuck them in you somewhere!

Yes I am ripped. Hopefully this is the final, the very last injustice of my "cockroach in my grits" week that I have been having. The hysterically funny thing here (yes I am trying to find humor, solace, a reset button, in all of this), is that I have far far far more dangerous things in my bag, than were my beard scissors.

I have a lighter in my bag, I have a cigar cutter in my bag, I have creams that could blind you in my bag, I have my French press and my coffee grinder in my bag, all of which are more easily weaponized, than are my beard scissors!

Of course I don't have to enter into every fight I am invited to as Joe Callaway famously said, and so I guess my future strategy for world travel will have to be purchasing my beard scissors in bulk, like I do cigar cutters (because those regularly get taken in security checks - that is just the cost of enjoying a cigar). And this trip to Cambodia is just gonna have some wild hairs in it.

First of all we killed no one

First of all we killed no one

That was a miracle all by itself, because I am pretty sure we broke every single law in the country as we sped through village after village on our way to Battambang. We covered a three hour trip in two hours and 20 minutes. Our wake probably harvested some of the rice fields we passed in a blur.

I just kept my head down and continued working on my client work, rather than watching our constant near misses and getting all tense and frustrated and fearful. Death won't be any more or less painful because I saw it coming. I can't control most of these events in my life, the driver speaks no English, and I speak no Cambodian. Just trust Jesus and pray for the brakes.

Now the return trip begins in 41 minutes.

Dissatisfaction with yourself

Dissatisfaction with yourself

This relates to self-awareness. According to HBR only 10-15% of leaders are self-aware. The general population will be even less for sure. This is awful amazing. I meant to say it that way, because it is awful and amazing at the same time. To never or rarely consider how others experience you in the world, is a pure tragedy. The wake we leave in life needs to be considered carefully and regularly. Irresponsible living is the only other result possible. This line of thought is largely about others dissatisfaction with how they experience you.

However an aspect to a lack of self-awareness that is not considered very often is the dissatisfaction with yourself. I find 100% of the people who are dissatisfied with themselves, are basically about as self-aware as cement block. They can't figure out WHY they are dissatisfied, nor what things they need/could do to rectify the situations of their lives in a positive manner. This of course leads to ongoing never-ending dissatisfaction. It is a repeating circle of pain and unhappiness.

There are other negative results that come from a lack of self-awareness, and no positive ones unless you consider cluelessness throughout life to be a positive. Hell, just pay attention to your anger, stress and you will get tons of feedback about what you value and what your weaknesses are, if you think that you need some kind of special dispensation to excuse your bad attitude.

Wake up man! See and feel how others are experiencing you! You will eventually be a lot happier with yourself when you get a grip on this one.

Reframing your thinking

Reframing your thinking

There are a number of ways that leaders of every variety accomplish this, from changing the narrative that they are telling themselves all the way to changing the lens through which we view the scale and scope of the problem or opportunity before us. It is the last way that I want to focus on today. But let me state that the first one is really important too! In fact it has produced the best and largest changes in my day to day experience of any tool I have used in the last three years. And having shared it often with others, they too regularly quote it and practice it as well. I am sure it works.

But to change the way you think on a larger and deeper scale, especially as you get older, requires more than just changing the narrative, as powerful as that may be. Changing lens is necessary because the one most of us employ is from our childhood - and this is a very very different world than you grew up in and developed in. The lens most people use is just too limited to be very helpful. You need a better view, a better perspective to be able to reconstruct what you are trying to accomplish. Most people die with their best work still inside them, because they are using an outdated or too small lens.

When I was a boy growing up in MooCow GA, there was a woods behind our house. It seem large and huge and vast to me as a kid. Now I realize that it only covered a couple of acres at most. After living in five different countries over the last 30 years, that tiny forest was in reality just a stand of trees. But the lens of my youth could not see it for what it was. Having said that, it was adequate for what I needed at that time in my life. I need far far more today. Likely you do too. Especially as we get older, for the tendency will be to pull in our boundaries rather than forging new and expanded ones.

Whether you like what I am stating or not, it doesn't really matter, since you will invariably face opportunities and challenges whether or not you want this to happen. It is simply part and parcel of living. As long as you are living, you might as well live well and fully. My learning curve and my change curves are so sharp, that it makes my hermit soul shudder and scream! But in order to see the world, _my world_, as it really is, I have to move out of the woods of my youth, and fly high so that I can see the endless jungles of the Amazon or southeast Asia.

When we change the lens through which we are viewing the world, we can change our entire reference point. This is how we can thrive in the opportunities and challenges that we have coming our way. The questions that I ask myself each day to reach these heights, are "what value am I providing in this situation?" "What do I need to learn in order to help this move forward?" "What can I ask to help others see a panoramic view?" What will bring clarity to this situation or event or person?" "What needs to happen to see growth?"

How much do you need to be rich?

How much do you need to be rich?

Ok it might of had the smell of clickbait, but it was fairly irresistible clickbait. I bit. And it made me think hard about being rich, and that thought makes me stop literally (stopped here to text the kids and say thank you for recent actions). Ok thank you said. So clearly I measure the idea of "richness" more along relational lines than financial lines, but as I was thinking about it, you could measure it in a number of other ways as well. 

Lots of people measure rich in terms of experiences. Like this business class lounge where I currently sitting would be considered "rich" by many peoples standards and expectations. However I sit in a lot of business class lounges and not a single one of them equals the comfort and pleasure of sitting in my own living room. On the other hand, they are more comfortable than what those people outside of this lounge are sitting on. So business class travel I would put into the category of experience that the more rare it is, the more rich it feels. And now that I consider that thought more carefully the more I think that this will likely be true in most categories.

So what is rich, yet not in the rare experience category? Well I think that my relationships with my wife and dad, then my children and their spouses, and then my grandchildren, and then my friends have generally an even and steady flow of rich about them. They aren't rare, but they are almost always positive. That is rich of the first order. Hell, it might even be rare as well. Relationally and emotionally and spiritually and physically my life is very rich by any standards.

It was the financial amounts listed to qualify as being rich, which astonished me. When surveyed 1000 people said that to be "comfortable" financially they needed $1.4 million, or $2.4 million to feel "wealthy." While I may be very very rich in many ways, these numbers don't even feel real to me. Completely in a different financial universe than were I live. Not really all that interested in this much stuff because I want to own my stuff and not have it own me. I am already rich beyond counting. (You can read the article that got me thinking along these lines here)

Every year it gets more difficult to change

Every year it gets more difficult to change

This is more technically known as "cognitive inertia" as most of the time we find ourselves searching for and seeing confirmation for what we hold as true or accurate - confirmation bias they call it. But change is more important than ever as we age, and in fact is one of the few undeniable things that we can't avoid if we want to continue to have a life.

Yet increasing years and the culmination of experience and our histories, combined with a nostalgia for the well-polished past, selective memory about ourselves and our actions, decreasing mental agility, overflooded minds, under-active imaginations, little play, ever more limited energy, and obsessions with health issues, among a hundred other concerns and foci, make change take on an oversized pressure and challenge. It "feels" more difficult, and that becomes a self-fulfilling experience for most as the years pile on and on.

All of this came to mind today as I met a "husky" young man this morning as I was starting my daily bike ride of 11 miles straight up the mountain. I immediately felt terrible for this young fellow. Husky was the polite word used for overweight boys in the 60's and 70's. I bought jeans out of the Sears and Roebuck catalogue in the "husky" section. I continued purchasing clothes in husky sections and the big man sections, and then XXL sections of stores until I was 50 years old. And honestly I may do so once again in the future. But miraculously (for me), I changed.

I changed my belief that it was in my genetic makeup to be overweight. I changed my belief (i.e. excuse) that I had no control over my weight. I changed what I thought was an appropriate amount of food to eat each day. I changed my acceptance that I did not have the personal resources or self control to take charge of my life. And as I said, it would be ever so easy to allow my discipline to fail, and for me to return to my husky state of existence, but at least for the last six years, I have been weight-appropriate for the very first time in my life. But if I do return to that undisciplined state I lived in for 50 years, it won't be because I no longer believe that I can't change. It will probably be because I am a lazy butthead, or some other nonsense as that, but I HAVE done it for SIX years. I did and have changed.

Some other things I am thinking through about changing are like: work, alcohol, church, what kind of son I am to my dad, purpose, significance, meaning, impact, technology, communication, power, money, retirement, and my wake in life ... I am at various stages of reassessing these matters - all of them.

I am intentionally and consciously changing and reassigning these matters importance in my life, and what I will choose to do about them. This kind of thinking is "thinking about thinking" kinds of reassessment. The very foundation of change. I have been meeting entirely too many people my age who are walking through their one and only life sleepwalking, or at the very least just waiting for it to end. So perhaps this blog will not resonate with you at all, but perhaps it will shake you up enough to realize that you are largely the sum total of your choices and beliefs and that you can chose where you stand on each one of them and do it differently. They call it change, and it will never be easier than today.

4:53 am and the sky is lighting up, but am I?

4:53 am and the sky is lighting up, but am I?

Yes this means that I am back in Macedonia, where the sky begins to color and the Muslim call to prayer both are happening at 4:53 am. It's been a very short night and will be a very long day as my jet is lagging more and more with every trip I take it seems. This is a day for strong coffee, grit and low expectations.

But I am in the world where I am this morning, Eastern Europe. And only I have the decades of history and experience in this place where I am. Only I have walked the paths that I have walked and with the peeps that I have walked this life with alongside of me. I have a definite unmistakable perspective that I can bring to these situations and these lives here. I have unique insights because I am unique. Perhaps I can even be astonishing and world changing with the ideas that are floating around only in me.

Seize the opportunity to be you today. There is no one else like you anywhere else, and we need your best self. (I am beholding to Nilofer Merchant for spawning these thoughts in me today)

Five Guys, . . . but not those five guys

Yes I wish this were a post about Five Guys, the bestest hamburger and freshest fries in the whole world kind of place, but it is not. Instead it is about you and me becoming like the five people we spend the most time with, or as Jim Rohn said it, we become the average of the five guys we spend the most time with.

The terribly difficult thing for many people who work regular jobs, is that they have little control over who they spend the most time with because their daily exchange of time and energy for money (work) dictates who those five people will be. I know. I "worked" for 33 years. Never had any real control over those five people.

But this is both true and not true, because now that I run the company and I only pick people to work with that I adore and value, I have come to realize the power of these choices is breathtaking. I have a number of teams of five guys that stretch pull push bulldoze smack shove force invite and tease me to be the best version of me. In fact one of the leaders of one of those teams of five, JS, I often say to him, "may I be the man you think I am" as I sign off on one of our great emails (that are often more meaty than actual conversations with regular mortals). And if you are fortunate enough to get an email from JS, or even better yet BV, then you better put your thinking cap on and show completely up, because these guys expect you to bring your best self to the table.

Yet the five guys is not true in the sense that you can raise the stakes and make it 10 guys, or 15 guys, or maybe even 20, but I don't have the relational chops to intensely interact deeply with that many people. But Rohn still has a point in making the five (in my case I made it six) guys be an intentional choice on your part. Own your life, decide what average you are gonna be.

“You have the face of an Italian”

”You have the face of an Italian”

Yes this was actually said to me! I know that you think I am joking but I am not. I have been called many things in my life but this was a first. Maybe I should get my hair cut at that salon more often?

Clearly the police officer was delusional but like all of us, he has certain concepts that he is dealing with. In his mind, however strangely, today I looked like whatever concept or mental picture he has of what an Italian face looks like. Now no one in Italy thinks I look like an Italian, but I digress.

These concepts we all carry around with us, shape what we see. Moreover they cause us to see things that may or may not actually be there. Clearly they can misinform us as well as help us make mental leaps. 

So while we cannot, not have these concepts, we can treat them carefully. They are mental spaces where we store things, or construct things that keep our presuppositions and assumptions warmed up and ready to go. They can also be mental handcuffs that prevent us from seeing and experiencing and changing the world with our eyes wide open and our hearts engaged. So I need to regularly question how I think I know what I think I know.

My apologies to all my Italian friends, but I rather liked the idea of having an Italian face.

Space

Space

I don't mean outer space, I mean space in our lives to live them properly. In a world that seems to be ever hungry for more and more, faster and faster, higher and higher, I desperately feel the need for space. In fact we might take years to get all the space that we really need.

Space to think, space to innovate, space to care, space to make something important, space to be compassionate, space to change the world, space build, space to create, space to serve, space to consider, space to contemplate, space to work excellence, space to be brilliant, space to matter and more space and more space.

Are you making space in your life?

So much that could be done

So much that could be done

But that would require you and me to make space in our lives to do it. And that unfortunately requires trade offs. Trade off's suck because, well . . . you have to trade off something else of value. So in the end it is a triage of value. I live on this razor's edge all the time. I actually have come to the place where I count how many weeks a year I am in this physical location over that physical location. It is the sharpest kind of trade off, where the values are so close together that it is nearly impossible to find a difference in them some days. And you thought this was going to be an easy task??

It is easy you argue, you just need to see the big picture and which value you choose becomes clear. If only. The big picture makes a number of assumptions that may or may not happen. If you were as old as me and you were certain that I had 20 more years to live this out and share this life with this person or affect that series of events, then agreed, the big picture could make it easy to have clarity. But since neither I nor the individuals in question have any such certainties, that big picture is only one of many other possible futures. And yes, you can get completely and utterly lost in these kinds of equations and unknowns. So don't.

Instead, plan as if the big picture was knowable and doable and reasonably certain. But live as if all you have was this moment for this is true and certain. And I for one make plans within plans and live moments within moments - regularly adjusting to the new moments I yet have because there is so much that could be done, to change the world in meaningfully better ways. Don't allow the trade offs nor the unknowable future paralyze you into inaction. 

The struggle of constant partial attention

The key word here is CONSTANT! Occasional partial attention is altogether something else than what I am struggling with here. I literally mean constant. If you think I jest, know that at this very moment I am hiding in a different state, off the highway, in my truck, with my phone turned off so that under no circumstances can I be found, and once again have what little focus and attention I can muster be fractured. Constantly. Incessantly. Relentlessly. Unceasingly.

Instead of increasing my skills and abilities at deep work, accomplishing something important, completing with excellence those actions expected of me, I fight to even hear what has been said, to process the noise filling the room, to engage in anything more taxing than solitaire. While my presence here in this location may be important in a lifelong relational sense, to honor and respect the person I am with, the price is proving to be very very high.

This practice of constant partial attention is derailing years of discipline, decades of effort, systems that have been formed carefully over a lifetime. Of course if you have a TV in your house and you have it on for hours each day you too struggle with this same dilemma. I am talking about a person and a situation, but you might find yourself facing the very similar scenario where you are finding yourself ever further behind in the important business of conducting yourself appropriately and with excellence in the world.

You may need to find a secluded place to park your truck, in another state, turn off your phone, light up your cigar and get to work.

Bombarded with opportunities

Bombarded with opportunities 

One of the most unexpected and wonderful and terrible things that happen in your 50's is that you get bombarded with opportunities. Really. Great. Opportunities. Not generic run of the mill stuff, but really great opportunities. The kind you could only dream about 20-30 years ago. Now they are here, knocking at your door. Almost begging you to take them and seize the day and change the world!

You had darn well better be unbelievably good at saying "no" otherwise you will destroy whatever synergy/excellence/effort/experience brought you to receive these opportunities in the first place. Do you have whiplash yet? Yes this is the stage of life where your best opportunities come, and where you say "no" more and better, and more frequently than ever before.

Pay attention here, you are probably looking at all of this wrong. Offered opportunities are NOT an invitation to change the world, they are instead mostly a social phenomenon designed to ride your coattails, mine your networks, and get something for nothing. For these reasons and many more, as I said you damn well better be unbelievably good at saying "no" to the vast majority of these really great opportunities. Offered opportunities ARE however an acknowledgment that you are at the peak of your career, that you are providing consistent value in your field, that you have something important to consider. 

So while being bombarded with opportunities is a standing ovation kind of experience, the wise will be super selective and say "no thank" you to the majority of them . . . so that you can keep producing the awesome stuff that got you to this point in the first place.

The central coast effect

The central coast effect

When I got into the car to drive to the airport it was 8 degrees Fahrenheit. It was so cold that the defroster button was frozen so tightly that I could not get it to work. The horn was frozen and it wouldn't work. Thank God the car actually started and got me to the airport so that I could go somewhere 50 degrees warmer!

Now three beautiful warm days later, I have to head back to the colder weather, but at least I got a great reprieve from the harsh winter weather. This is what I am mentally referring to as "the central coast effect" or another way to say it is change the story you are telling yourself or a third version could be, let's change this tune so that we can have a mental restart and do something beautiful.

We need these "mental weekend trips" away on a regular basis, so that we can see and experience all that is the now in vivid sharp accurate immediacy. We can be all present if we don't feel like we are stuck forever in a frozen wasteland. As Earl is fond of saying, "everyday is beautiful at my age" so too is the beauty of the central coast effect in mid-winter. 

Proud of the wrong things

Proud of the wrong things

Society and culture can be a confusing experience. We are conditioned to be proud of how busy we are, how hard we push ourselves, how little sleep we get, how much we can drink, how much we can accomplish on the least amount of resources.

I don't know about you, but when I do any single one of the things listed above, it has only negative consequences, except for the humble-bragging rights. Those are not the things we should be proud of at all. Instead . . . 

Today I am flying to work as is my standard custom, but I feel strong and invigorated because I precisely HAVEN'T done any of the things listed above. I limit my work on purpose, I Protect The Asset (ME!) from pushing too hard, I slept 8 hours of uninterrupted sleep last night. I did not drink anything for the last week. I make sure I have the resourcing to accomplish the tasks I need to do. So I am cranking it out and getting it done and changing the world precisely because I am proud of all the "wrong" things, which are really are all the right things!

Foggy days

After a great party last night for a friend's 41 birthday, it was deadly difficult to get up at 2:30 am this morning for the rush to the airport for my early early EARLY flight. But I did. It's the adult thing to do, you know, that whole go to work thingy. But I am certainly a little foggy today. 

And not only me, it was so foggy outside this morning that I could hardly find my car! And no that was/is an actual weather phenomenon not a metaphor for my mental struggles today. That was in the previous paragraph. But I digress, it was actually so foggy this morning, that I was pretty sure my flight was going to be canceled which often happens here. (And I would have happily drove back home and went right back to bed!) A few years ago the airport was closed almost every day for a six week fog extravaganza! But alas, since the plane I am currently riding in arrived last night BEFORE the fog arrived, we had something to ride the friendly skies with this morning, and the fog has never been a problem for the planes taking off, only landing.

So my flight flew, and so have I. And now I have a lovely 6 hour layover in Vienna before heading to Naples, and then a bus and then a train, and if all continues to go well I will arrive at my destination, at my hotel some 18 hours after getting up at 2:30 for the rush to the airport. All in a foggy day's work.

All the snowy travel places I have been

All the snowy travel places I have been

I am currently in Zagreb on my way home after a great week of work in Bosnia. But it is snowing like mad outside and my flight is questionable. As I was standing outside watching it snow, all the airports and bus stations I have been over the years in snow storms watching it come down in buckets and wondering if I will get home or not came back to me.

First of all were the years we lived in Central Canada. There we lived in the coldest temps we have ever experienced and there were a number of ice/snow/cold travel experiences. The worst one was when I had to go down to Minot, ND to pick up Brenda's mom from the airport so that she could be there with us for Jake's birth. It was in the -35 to -40 degrees below zero range, and the defroster in the car could never manage more than a small circle of cleared glass on the windshield even with the defroster on high the entire trip.

Then were the years we lived in Russia, where snow removal was iffy at best and de-icing non-existent. Those were some hairy flights, take-offs and landings. And many a bus trip and the waiting for a taxi or tram were done in the falling snow for hours.

And then the last 18 plus years in the former Yugoslavia. I have lost count how many days and hours I have waited and waited and waited to find out if we were flying out or not. Tonight is just another one, in a long series of such events in the life of an International worker living abroad in cold climates. But eventually I will get home, even if I have to wait until Spring.

Zagreb work days

Zagreb work days

It seems that I get laid over in Zagreb at least once every year for an extended time. Between the last time this happened and today, hell they went and built a new airport!! The arrivals hall alone is bigger than the last airport altogether. Now I sit here at Nero Coffee enjoying space, time, quiet (before was always so crowded and noisy and intrusive) the warm sun on my back, a fine coffee, an excellent apple strudel, and free WiFi. Now if I were only well rested, it would be an ideal working day. In the past this airport was so crowded I would go to the nearest hotel and pay the day rate so that I could get some work done.

This layover is not quite long enough for that, but I am not sure that it is even needed. This ambience works just fine for 3-4 hours. So I am traveling light and fast, only a Timbuktu messenger bag for the three day trip to Bosnia. A few shirts, clean undies, a few socks, a few cigars, an iPad and couple of phones, and I can conquer the world of travel and client work.

Now if I could only resolve the Brenda Earl Asia conundrum I would be a rock star. That will be what I work on after I finish writing this short blog. THAT requires a great deal of thinking, and then, a great deal more thinking. Ah Zagreb work days at their best.

I am not desperate anymore

This was a statement made by the son of one of my clients recently. It reflects the years of work I have put into this family and indeed, they are not desperate any longer. They are developing leaders hand over fist, they are expanding their ministry and extending their reach by their investment in others - just like I have in them.

I too, am no longer desperate. Desperation is the condition of working in an environment of scarcity. It is a lack of all that you need to move forward and succeed, and can be caused by the lack of vision and understanding of you the individual, or the weakness of the organization that you work with, creating a too narrow understanding of what is important and what is possible. It is a terrible way to live and lead.

Abundance thinking and abundance actions are the polar opposite. You understand that you have all that you need or actually could ever want or use effectively, but you have to grasp what you could not see before, take what you did not believe to be available before, develop what you attract with your character and vision and the very compelling nature of what kind of giver and developer you are with others. Live in abundance.

Cross throwing

Cross throwing 

Today is a holy day here, the annual cross throwing day. This is the day when crowds gather in the center of town and the Pope literally throws a cross into the freezing cold waters of the Vardar river from a bridge right in the center of town. Then with the TV cameras whirling, people literally jump into the freezing cold rushing water all vying to retrieve the cross. All kinds of good stuff is supposed to happen to the person who retrieves it. All the other swimmers who are freezing to near death, all the onlookers who are freezing while watching this spectacular display of desperation, all of them go home with nothing except maybe frostbite.

I like my version of the cross better, where all who come are welcome, all win the grace and mercy and forgiveness of the Savior who gave everything so that all could benefit on that death instrument. There is no competition here, no better or lesser saints, no faster or slower recipients, all who show up at the cross and confess, receive. There is no respecter of class, wealth, need or swimming ability at play here.

What you should care about, and not care about

I read thousands of RSS feeds every year. It is where I mine for bitcoin, . . . uh huh, I mean I mine for insight and information and tools to help my clients move forward in their leadership development. I have noticed a number of trends over the years and one that is becoming clearer and clearer is personal optimization as the actual goal of development material being written about out in the wild.

But leadership is about helping others move forward. We need leaders to help us navigate the difficult and complex, not the easy. So development from where I am sitting/standing is more about character and skills and empathy and learning, than it is about optimization.

Personal optimization leads us down the wrong path, it is the wrong direction I think. It is in the words of Mark Manson a sickness. He says it like this " . . . you will feel that you’re perpetually entitled to be comfortable and happy at all times, that everything is supposed to be just exactly the . . . way you want it to be. This is a sickness. And it will eat you alive. You will see every adversity as an injustice, every challenge as a failure, every inconvenience as a personal slight, every disagreement as a betrayal. You will be confined to your own petty, skull-sized hell, burning with entitlement and bluster, running circles around your very own personal Feedback Loop from Hell, in constant motion yet arriving nowhere." (From his book "The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck" p.13)

You don't want to live in this place. Instead you want to make a difference, to matter, to accomplish the important, the lasting, the sustainable change that will help others move forward. Care about this, rather than about your own personal optimization. It will make all the difference in someone's life.

The saddest of days

The saddest days

The saddest days are when your family flies away again. A life of goodbyes. It was a great visit, which is awesome and terrible. Awesome because it was great to have them here and awesome to spend time with them day after day, to have the house filled with noise and laughter once again. Terrible because it was awesome, and it had to end. Thankful, but sad. A life of goodbyes.

The saddest days are when you can't get that terrible day out of your mind when your niece called and told you that you brother was gone forever. So thankful for the days and years that we had with him, but everything is changed forever because he is no longer with us. Thankful but sad. A life of goodbyes.

The saddest days are when you realize once again that you won't ever hear your mother laugh again, the loveliest of sounds. She too is gone. Thankful for all the years we had together, but sad there won't be any more. A life of goodbyes.

I am weary of goodbyes, and have been for a long while. The saddest of days. Here is hoping for when and that we can be together again.

Should I let this dream job go?

Should I let this dream job go?

It wouldn't be the first time. I have already let one dream job go. Best. Decision. Ever.

For a number of decades I was a pastoring various churches, I know I know, you can't imagine me doing that, and neither can I any longer. But I was, and the last one was perfect. Few problems, low maintenance, highly intelligent, very appreciative, wonderfully supportive, and overall a perfect church (yes they actually do exist, although extremely rare I admit) to lead. I got to do all the pieces I am best at, and very few of the pieces I suck at doing. Like I said, a dream job. I walked away.

Yep, I walked away from the dream job/perfect church, and have been offered much money since leaving five years ago, to return as leader. Not even remotely interested. Because I was coasting. And that is death.

Now I currently have a second dream job, one that I am even better at than I am at leading perfect churches! Few ever get one dream job and I have had two! Now I am seriously thinking about walking way from this one. Because its coasting again. And that is death.

Most people are looking for the perfect job where you can coast on your strengths and look amazing all the time. But folks you need pressure, cliffs, danger, failure, explosions, mistakes, to stay sharp and keep growing! Being stretched (which often translates into being scared!) and at risk of serious failure is necessary to a healthy growing developing person. No I am not an adrenaline junkie . . . very much. Coasting can be great after a long periods of highly stressful living, but if you stay there long, you go stale or worse, just existing, and that is death.

If you don't believe me, then read this https://www.lollydaskal.com/leadership/how-to-stop-seeing-struggle-as-something-negative/

So much noise

And not all of it bad. These holidays and vacation days have been super fun because of the special noise of family in the house. Yes it is much louder than normal, and that is good, the sound of laughter and real conversation and expressions of admiration and love.

But silence and mental space are not replaceable nor good gauges of the various values of which kinds of sounds are positive and healthy (which is a very small portion of the overall noise) and which kind of noise is simply noise. Useless distracting debilitating irritating frustrating claustrophobic noise. There is no space to think. There is no place to stop and assess. There is no room to gather your thoughts and order them and let them be important.

The noise is infectious, contaminating every thing it comes in contact with, and whatever happened to companionable silence? Noise infection makes everyone suspect something is wrong and out of sync relationally if more noise isn't constantly being produced! Many interactions with people feel like these firecracker bombs we have here in Eastern Europe at this time of year, children gleefully shocking and startling every unsuspecting person within earshot. Whatever happened to just enjoying a person's nearness and warmth without the impurity of noise or senseless talk?

So much noise. How is a person to create, make, produce something compelling exciting important significant or even interesting, something that matters, when the noise is so loud and pervasive? Find that space, that mental room or glade, the zone, the deep meditation spot where you can actually accomplish something. The world needs what you are thinking and can create.

The last human freedom

Today in my RSS feeds were articles about how Iran and DRC politicians/dictators are cutting off internet and mobile service to their citizens, in order to try and contain the violence being unleashed toward them (the dictators/politicians). Human freedoms seem to be under siege on this first day of 2018.

Everyone feels like their options and freedoms are being restricted at some point along the way of their lives. Of course this is a huge scale - it is one thing to be thwarted in your desire to veg-out and have some me time because of the needs/demands of your family for instance, versus being in a concentration camp and being systematically stripped of everything that makes you human. That is a huge scale.

On this later one, Viktor Frankl (Holocast/Auschwitz survivor) says, "Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of human freedoms - to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way." He meant this literally, that everything, everything can be taken away and was. Except the last human freedom - to choose your posture, or attitude to what is happening to you.

This is my greatest aspiration and my most regular disappointment in myself. Even though I catch myself quicker and quicker, I still fail to reign in my tongue and my thoughts soon enough many times. Here is my primary goal for the rest of my life, to enjoy this great last human freedom - to choose well how I see the events and their significance, that happen in my conversations and life.

Christmas past, present and future

Christmas was always great around our place. My folks were borderline poor, but you would have never known, because they did not talk about it, and were great planners. I have such great memories of Christmas as a kid.

Once I was a teenager and on through college, Christmas was still great, but I also worked a ton of hours, pulling double shifts and occasionally triple shifts, because I could and because the pay was so much better - no one else would work the Christmas shifts. But I still remember getting with the parentals and the larger family, to eat, drink and be merry together.

Then as a married adult, leading a church, Christmas was usually about work, the four Sundays of Advent, the new one time visitors, this were my least favorite memories of Christmas. When the kids came along, Christmas became the richest ever, watching their joy and excitement each year. And the anticipation was soooooo sweet. My kids will tell you, I Loooovvveeee Christmas.

The poorest Christmas ever - when Heidi, our oldest, was not even one year old, I was in Seminary and the only gift I could buy was a cheap doll for Heidi, nothing for Brenda, nothing for me. Heidi being five months old did not appreciate what that doll cost me. And the most I can ever remember us spending at Christmas was about 10 grand, when we flew home from Macedonia, all five of us, and spent three weeks traveling and visiting everyone. But they were all great, the poor ones and the rich ones.

And this one today, just my dad and me together, brother is gone and mom is gone, and Brenda is waiting for me in Macedonia (will leave tomorrow to get to her), but it is precious in its own way, because who knows how many more I get before its just me? Gratitude and wonder and excitement that Emmanuel is with us, and that He gave us the magnificent opportunities to give and give to others throughout our lives.

The chain of reasoning

The chain of reasoning

This is the thing we call thinking, or more accurately, like to think of as thinking. It is how you get from A to B mentally you surmise and you would be partially correct, in the sense that it can (and sometimes does) happen that way. But as Alan Jacobs shows in his book "How to Think" this is much more frequently an emotional movement than and mental movement. Even (mostly?) the highly educated folks like myself, we think according to how we feel, far far more than we "think" according to thinking - or a chain of reasoning, though I would imagine that most would resist the suggestion than they are following their feelings more than a chain of reasoning.

Jacobs points out situation after situation where we "decide" or "think" what is socially or culturally acceptable, with no real chain of reasoning at play in any discernible measure. When I step back and privately take a hard look at my "thinking" I can see what he is saying. (Privately being an important at part of this, because it is only then that you might be your most brutally honest with yourself.)

Or you might find this little pointer from Dan Rockwell enlightening:
"1. Assume the worst. Find the worst.
2. Look for problems. Find difficulties and obstacles.
3. Look for progress. Find gratitude. (The benefits of gratitude make it a magic elixir for health and happiness.)
4. Search for opportunities. Find energy.
You find what you look for. Then you justify your findings."

See there is no chain of reasoning here, just finding what we look for, and then we justify what we found, haha! I kid you not, but two months ago, I would have said that you were full of weirdness if you had suggested what I am suggesting (or rather what Jacobs is suggesting and I am just whole hardily agreeing with) here. But it is inescapably true. 

I was recently mediating a conflict between a leadership couple, and their board. I was doing this largely as a favor to a friend, because this is not normally my kind of gig. So I listened to what the leadership couple was telling me about how terrible the board was, how impossible to work with they were, how they were sabotaging all the great work that the leadership couple was inspiring the organization to accomplish.

However! I should have ended that meeting within the first 5 minutes, when it became abundantly clear, that the leadership couple were the psycho's in the room, not the board members. The board members were desperate to actually accomplish something important. The leadership couple were looking for wholesale capitulation! They had/have zero capacity for anyone to disagree with them ever!! You find what you look for and then justify what you found. It worked precisely like that from beginning to end for this leadership couple.

Now I am trying to isolate any such patterns and "feelings" in myself and see the ways that I am sure I am feeling my thinking forward, rather than following any chain of reasoning.

Cognitive bias and misunderstandings

Cognitive bias and misunderstandings

The missional world can be a really strange one. All of my business clients think so poorly of missions and missionaries that it is embarrassing. Most of the national pastors and national Christians I know and work with, also think so poorly of missionaries and have so many scratch-their-head moments about missional personal, that it makes me want to crawl under a rock many days. While I consistently and creatively paint other possible narratives about these people, the sad truth is that often their low opinions are warranted.

It seems that the missional world is especially afflicted with the Dunning-Kruger effect. I find myself flabbergasted and appalled at how little these recruits and soon to be "missionaries" and new arrivals are rock solid convinced that they can jump on an airplane, and take their American selves to any other place in the world and reproduce whatever in that new context. Immediately. With no actual competence. With no real honest skills. With no language learning. With no training. They are just so effing wonderful, all the world will bow to their mere presence or some other cat flossing fantasy that these people have in their very wrong and terribly screwed up heads.

They over-estimate their intelligence, their ability, their competence, their insight, their wisdom, their ideas, their importance, even their likability to the point where I want to throw up. They underestimate the need to retool, learn, study, underestimate the need for humility and gentleness, underestimate their cultural arrogance, and their ability to be fluid and flexible, their empathy and social graces. I could go on for hours. And hours.

Needless to say, few of them make it beyond their first term thank goodness. That at least puts some boundaries on the damage they can do forever on the ground. The rest of them often end up being what is currently known as "North American based missionaries" which means they live in America for the most part, travel regularly, and create havoc under the guise of do-good-ism. They never hesitate to tell me what I am doing wrong, even though I have lived here for 18 plus years and speak the language and have relational equity that they can not even see nor imagine. You just can't tell these folks anything, because they already know it all.

One year ago today

One year ago today

You left this world. Our new normal without you is really hard sometimes. More shallow and less significant, full of more meaninglessness. Less beautiful and less vibrant, more volatile and more colorless. The pleasures are smaller and have more space between them. The day to day seems more grinding and more pointless. While I would never wish you back here the way you were at the end, I mourn all that we lost that day and since. Grief is not what I expected both more and different and it feels like it will never end. My hope is that you are experiencing the grandest of moments in eternity, no one deserves such a future and present more than you. I wish I had been a better son, a better man, and honestly I am trying to be both now. On this hill in this cemetery on this one year anniversary of your departure, your resting place seems cold and lonely, but that is probably just me missing you. It is so hard to have clarity about how to finish well, and I wish you were here, all of you like you were 10 years ago so I could gain your wisdom once again. This first year without you has been a rollercoaster of emotions, and I think much about all that you gave me along the way, and pray that I can pay it forward nearly as well to my kids, your grandkids and greatgrandkids.

Last year we all gathered at this place to honor you. We sang songs you loved and said words to express how humbled we were to have you in our lives. It was a beautiful November day just like today, and just as empty in other ways. Half of our nucleus of four passed last year, but it seems like 4/5's gone.  I am trying to make a good go of it without you here, what choice do I have? But it takes too much energy. Other grievers just walked over your spot in this hill, unaware of what an amazing person they just passed as they brought a new bouquet for someone just down the hill from you. I hope they find more comfort than I have. 

Digital Nomading

Digital Nomading

I am returning from one of the digital nomad centers of the world, Chiang Mai, Thailand. In fact the AirB&B I was staying at is one of the hotspots and favorite hangouts of such folks. I saw some of them eating breakfast lunch and dinner there. Mind you the food is really good at Food4Thought and if I did not prefer to eat the local fare more, I could easily see myself doing the same. Many people I meet in the world want to do just this type of locationless remote work, but lack the hard skills to pull it off, or perhaps the cajoles. 

First of all "digital" which can mean a number of things. Telecommunications is what this currently means for me, not coding or software creation or blogging or whatever because I don't really understand how to monetize those things, although I certainly could learn. And for the record, I am not sure that sure that telecommunications alone would even qualify me for "digital" as every single person I have met to-date abroad hopscotching from one location to another has/is producing a "digital" product. Whereas I am in the people development business and that is not a digital product. Yet I depend on the internet to fully extend my reach and maximize my engagement with every client regardless of my immediate location on the planet surface. And admittedly I often fantasize about just sitting at this keyboard and producing something tangible that would pay the bills, and then what . . . I already get the best possible interactions with the best possible people in the world, how am I gonna improve on that?? I guess the growing ever stronger introvert in me wants more days of no interactions with anyone?? Not sure that is healthy.

And in case you are wondering about the purpose and point of this particular blog post, there is only free thinking time here, no real point at all. Wondering and thinking and enjoying the feel of the keyboard at 35k feet and letting my brain wander and create and connect loose points into some categories.

I am not a "dude" like all these digital nomaders are either. They are a hard drinking, fast living crowd of high-living ping pong balls. I understand the weight of my presence in a room and in a conversation, but my metrics are fairly different than this crowd. They have the local babes under their arms, a beer in each hand, paying way way too much for temporary humongous condos, and having a pissing contest with all other nomaders about how much money they can make how easily.

I on the other hand, have been married to the babe for 31 plus years, would love to be able to drink all the beer I want without the consequences, choose my destinations based on the face to face conversations I can generate from that location or the needs pulling me to that particular location, live small on purpose but not counting pennies, and am not impressed with material wealth at all really. Money is simply a tool to make things easier better faster. Relationships are life. Having said/wrote all that, I nomad plenty. To the point where I pretty much despise travel period. But I nomad toward relational connections, not internet speeds and cheap locations, because as I stated, I am in the people development business, not the traveling business.

So am I a digital nomad?? Totally. Am I the stereotypical digital nomad? Not at all. I am the much older, grandfatherly version of what most people think of and mean when they said digital nomad. Now its time to go write the book.

Sneezing and coughing on my food

Sneezing and coughing on my food

It's been that kind of week. The guy serving up the food, coughed right on my plate, right onto my food. Now I am not a germaphobe or anything like that, but hell even I can't get past the idea of some bloke coughing on my chow right before I am supposed to sit down and eat it. So that was a wasted $10.  And the same thing happened in Cambodia last month at the breakfast buffet, some dude from India or Bangladesh sneezed right on the buffet, in the fruit section. I don't know about you, but my meal is OVER when this happens and I know it has happened. 

It has been that kind of week, where everyone is metaphorically coughing and sneezing over my food, whether it is the police, the peeps at the ministry of health, or the peeps at the bank, it is like they are all out to get me, which of course I know is ludicrous, but it stills feels that way, when the overall experience with them is so negative. Some days I don't like it here at all. Not to mention that I have no interest whatsoever in chasing down this visa shit at the police, ministry of health and bank to begin with, none at all. Evidently I need to ride my motorcycle or some other mental  health activity!

Today is all you have

Today is all you have

Today was my last day in Asia on this trip. I added two new clients (one on Thailand and one in Myanmar), visited another client in Cambodia, visited some other peeps that don't quite fit into the client category yet I still contribute to their lives in some rich ways, and best of all, hung out and had some great conversations and times with my buddy Jim (who is also my boss in certain contexts :-)!) I am never bored here and I really love the perpetual summer weather, even the rain most days.

But today was the last day and I worked it to the max. I got up at 5:30 even after a late night with my AirB&B host as we were catching and enjoying a fine cigar together, since we had not seen each other in 2 years. Then on the bike and a 3800 foot climb to the peak of the mountain (while listening to an audiobook), then lifted weights, then returned the bike rental (and received another verbal spanking from Mr Tsa), and then grabbed a coffee, and then had my very favorite noodles, and then a quick shower and then a meeting (which resulted in a new client) while packing my bags rapidly and calling a GRAB taxi and headed to the airport for the first of four airports and three flights. 

Today is all you have. I packed just about everything imaginable into this day in the hours available while transitioning to different cities and jumping through all the airport hoops and security and changing airlines and waiting for bags and going through immigration as I am leaving one country and headed to another, and then another. But the place of my body on the planet doesn't determine the quality of the day. It does impact it, but only I have control of how I view what happens throughout the day. This is always a great lesson to remember.

There is nothing more satisfying

There is nothing more satisfying 

There is nothing more satisfying than when you hear a client say, "I need to form a different narrative about this event." The client had been relating a rather negative story of what had happened to him, (and he is not generally a negative person) and when he completed the tale, he then said the magic words that Made. My. Day. Week. Month! When a client hears what you say, sees the value of that wisdom and then starts using it as their own material - that is pure gold in my world. 

This one with JA was the most direct one of this particular trip, but on three other occasions while in Asia, I heard my words being bandied about. Lets be straight here, this is not about me, this is not about being appreciated, this about helping others succeed! It's all about the client, your partner, the person you are committed to helping move forward and thrive!

So if you completely can resonate with what I am saying here, if you can fully embrace not getting the credit or the star light or the big head, if you can give yourself totally to someone else shining and succeeding - have you considered a career in consulting? It can be the sweetest work you ever imagined.

The longest Halloween

The longest Halloween

When I woke up yesterday it was October 31. When I woke up today it was October 31. Such are the experiences of the International traveling sop who changes time zones far far too often. That would be me in case you are wondering. However I am generally thankful for each moment of my life, because first of all I realize how rare my opportunities are compared to the majority of the world and second, because I am enjoying my work more than ever before while ruthlessly practicing living in the immediate present. For someone like me who was formerly the ultimate version of future thinking, future worrying, future everything, this is a major major change for me. I do better at it some days than on other days. Those days (and especially evenings) where I succeed, I feel more complete and sleep far better.

So the longest Halloween was also a great memory. I don't carry any of the bad memories, obsessive theology, or cultural frustrations/joys about Halloween. For the last almost 40 years, it has simply been John's birthday. John being my roommate from college and one of my longest friendships/relationships in the world. And plus, it makes it super easy to remember, in fact almost impossible to forget. So a good long walk down memory lane about such an astonishing person as John, made the longest Halloween a fine day.

Floods headwinds and waiting

Floods headwinds and waiting

It was a disaster from the beginning, or you would think. When I opened the door in the pre-dawn gloom, there was six inches of water lapping at my feet! You know something is wrong when the water is that deep in the main dining room! Someone left the spigot tuned on! No! When I turn it off, the water keeps pouring. Burst pipe. I am here alone. Not my house. No idea where the water main is, and it takes me 30 minutes to realize that I can't fix this (i.e. stop the flow/flood) and call for help.

By now my morning ride is way behind schedule! And I have a full day beyond that scheduled. All you can do on a day like this is pedal harder and make up for lost time. If only it had ended there. So when I finally get on the road, I have a headwind right in my face, slowing me down, holding me back . . . you just keep on pedaling, and face the fact that while it is mentally twice as hard with a headwind, it is only actually slowing you fractionally.

And then with the breakfast break it continues. After crossing three incredibly steep and long mountain ranges, your body needs food! And so I stop at my usual place. Where I usually get my food in less than 10 minutes. Of course not today. 40 minutes later I am finally rolling out there, way way behind schedule. Pedal harder, focus more, keep pedaling.

And the final stretch finally comes into view, the last eight miles of the 56 total. And I hit every single traffic light as RED. All six of them. And now that I am out of the mountains, headwind again. Pedal harder, focus more, keep pedaling. Resilience and consistency and effort go a long long way. I made up almost a hour of time by pedaling harder, focusing more, keep pedaling. Even all these factors that I could not control, only pushed my schedule back by 20 minutes in the end, because of intensifying what I could control. Me. 

We are stronger than we think.

A babe in comparison

The trafficking and rescue operation was really amazing. Things have changed so much there since I was last cleared to visit the facility. This time I actually got to speak with six of the girls, as they shyly practiced their English on me. And since Asian men generally color their hair until they die, they all thought I was older than dirt with all my gray beard and gray hair. I had a good laugh about that, because I feel about as old a dirt much of the time. But compared to what these girls have gone through in their horrible short lives, I am a babe.

Comparison to those who you think are better off, rich, pretty, younger, more carefree, or whatever, is a great joy stealer. But sometimes, comparison to those who are far worse off, can be an excellent gratefulness, thankfulness, appreciation generator. I practice gratefulness each day on purpose, but this was sobering at the realization of how very little suffering I have ever experienced in my life. As if the Khmer Rouge was not enough to destroy Cambodia, then the traffickers, and the sex tourists, and the sex-pats and those who want to hurt and destroy, generate a system of slavery and abuse that affects every level of society. 

While I am thankful for all the privilege of my life, it is not enough. One has to take actions, give ferociously, work tirelessly, and make change happen for the sake of these individual girls, but also for the sake of the world at large too. This is what we get to do. Don't miss your part.

The contrast

It is a hot sweaty 99% humid Siem Reap Cambodia evening. Sitting by the pool having a fine cigar and a Jamisons. It is quiet and peaceful here where I am sitting, but that was not the experience a few moments ago in the night market. Endless offers, requests, propositions, hopes and wishes. Very dangerous for a man walking alone! 

It is difficult thinking about how close to the edge of survival these people are, and how little money was being asked for these proposals. As a friend of my recently remarked, we have never known what it is like to live like this. So close to disaster all the time. Desperate to eat today. To feed the kids a single meal a day.

Makes one despair unless you dig in and resolve to make a difference in this world. That is why I am here. This is what we were made for. This is what we are called to do.

I am being managed!

I am being managed!

It was shocking to discover. Not. Of course I am being managed. Mr Tsa has long been impressed with my abilities to burn through his bike repairs. I stretch chains faster than anyone, destroy front brakes faster than anyone, and log more miles than an antelope. So when I show up at his shop to rent a bike for the month, of course he is gonna manage me. He has 10 years of experience fixing my wear and tear on bikes. 

He started laughing when I showed up today. He said, "even I did not think you would be back for repairs this quick." I mean I have only put 400 measly kilometers on the bike these five days. But he happily told me why I was riding this bike, rather than one of his fancy bikes - he knew he was gonna have to fix it three or four times this month. And now it is as good as new. I mean I can't help it if it rains all the time nor that the mountains are so steep.

This is only one example of me being managed. I could tell you ways that my wife, my dad, my neighbors are all managing me. You are being managed too!

So the question is not if I am being managed, the question that is important is WHY am I being managed?? There are bad reasons for being managed, like you are a problem child, or like you are a bad attitude poisoning everything in your wake, or you horriblize everyone you talk about, or you only see the bad in everything, etc etc.

And there are great reasons for being managed, like I am a stud on a bicycle and yet Mr Tsa needs to make a profit. And reasons like I also bring great value to the lives of my wife, dad and neighbors, and so they manage me to keep things humming along. These are the calculations that we all make in order to keep things in the best possible balance, and to make sure that we raise boundaries against damage to ourselves and those we care about and those we interact with every day.

There are so many possibilities

There are so many possibilities . . . 

It can be paralyzing. It is imperative that we find and groom our best selves - to be more. If we fail to accomplish this, the best of those possibilities will never get sifted, tried, sharpened, experienced, polished, and this needs to happen on my own terms and definitions, not someone else's terms (to raise the bar, not make it more manageable). No whimpering exchange of time and effort for money. This requires far more risk, because I gotta own this.

You have to know your calling, how you can best serve, what you were designed to accomplish, what you are made of, how much grit you may have, where your lasting contribution will be made, what you are compelled to accomplish. This demands you push yourself on a completely new scale. This requires far more risk, because there are no more safety nets (actually they never existed before, but most delude themselves into thinking that there are safety nets around them).

In this VUCA world, remarkable leaders are more sorely needed than ever before. Take the chance, stop living a 9-5 life, and let's go change the world. It will probably take and cost everything, and then you are only at the beginning. But you can't take it with you when you leave this world, so why not die by living the most audacious life possible - life was meant to be spent (Wilson).

If this does not sound like you, or at least the you you want to become, then hit delete, this is not for you. Your possibilities are limited. Your risk is low.

We leave 15 minutes early?!

Anyone who spends as much time as I do, chasing flights and connections around the world, can tell you what a rare rare experience this is, for a flight to leave early. Not on time and not when scheduled, but early. I think this happens to me about once every 100 flights or so in a good year. This is the first time in about 2.5 years that this has happened the best I can recall. Needless to say, this is a huge anomaly. It bodes well for me, if this is the standard that the entire 3.5 week trip entails. I could really use some better than expected, or better than the norms experiences. Too much has been really disappointing in recent weeks.

What makes this early departure so great is that it exceeds my expectations! So few companies do this on a regular basis, that when it happens, it is worth noting and remembering. I regularly experience this with all things Apple, and most things Amazon. That is why they have not only my regular faithful business, but also endless recommendations to others in all my networks about how great they are and have been etc etc.  These recommendations are worth three to four times as much as my personal business transactions with these two businesses.

Apple and Amazon get it. They will work tirelessly to give me "exceed my expectation" experiences. Anything else for them would be a failure. And this is not to say that every product I purchase from Apple has been perfect. Nor is every transaction with Amazon and their market solutions always perfectly satisfying. But they are stellar enough that they are head and shoulders ahead and above anyone else out there. Can't believe that I used to feel this way about Toshiba computers, and then Sony computers, neither of which would I use as a tire chock for my 20 year old Renault today. You would have to pay ME big bucks to summit myself to those experiences again.hu

And why did I recently stop using Holiday Inn affiliate hotel, Candlewood Suites? Because of one horrific gaffe and all the little gaffe's that followed as they tried to "make up" for a huge leadership failure. I had one of the worst experiences ever in a hotel on my trip recently to PA from GA. Repeated calls to the front desk received no actions, finally only a threat to involve the local police and deputy sheriffs got me any relief at 3:36 am. I didn't think I should have to pay for such an experience, but I did - $178.10 worth, of which they eventually refunded me a third, and gave me 10,000 useless points on a less than useless card which I will never be able to take advantage of. And they wrote me a bunch of letters apologizing. But they never once admitted that they cost me a nights sleep, that they cost me business the following day, and that they are responsible for the property and grounds that we all pay them money for, so that we can SLEEP! When 11 pm rolled around it became clear that the party was not going to be stopped by the local employee's, I should have taken responsibility for myself and moved to another hotel, regardless of the cost, because my clients are worth that much and so am I. However I have properly voted after the event, by taking my considerable business account to other hotels, and most importantly telling my networks that you cannot reasonably expect the previous hotel chain to step up and do the right thing for you as the customer.

So an early departure? Exceeding my expectations? Damn right it is important. It is the only way to keep customers in the modern world, and I am far more forgiving than most of my fellow travelers! You can reference this "Good" is not enough - Lead Change Group blog to see my point and my point of reference.

How much things have changed

No Malev Airlines, no Czech Airlines, no MAT airlines, and these three were the primary airlines I would have used each day when we first moved to Macedonia 18+ years ago. They don't even exist any longer. When I flew out today, I flew on Qatar Airlines! And sitting at the gates were four aircraft for Wizz Air (yes that is really their name and no English is not their first language), one Austrian airline plane and then this A320 for Qatar. I am sitting here snacking on warmed mixed nuts and drinking a 15 year old Glenfiddich writing to you on a computer thinner than the old paper books of long ago with a touch screen and a Bluetooth keyboard, neither of which even existed when we first moved to Macedonia (and since I am going to rural Asia and roughing it a bit, I don't even have the nice new iPad Pro with me, but still the tech I do have with me was inconceivable 18 years ago).

That is the most basic summary of the massive world changing difference in air travel out of little old Macedonia in 18 years. Yes air travel is a lot less fun and pleasureable than it was 18 years ago, but many of the changes are for the better. More flying options, far cheaper, and the ability to actually get some awesome work done on a machine that does not even weigh a pound. And granted, this is on good days. Flying on those Wizz Air flights is serious Cattle Class battles ... 

And don't forget that my pilot is British and my cabin crew is Serbian and Macedonian  both schooled in USA Universities. While I may be flying a Muslim Airline, the staff is a great mixture of local and International, and all Western Trained. Having said that, this may be the oldest A320 I have flown on in two decades - no USB ports! No Screens in the back of the seat in front of you. I like it! 

The book I am currently reading "The New Leadership Literacies" says that the changes I am documenting here are nothing compared to the ones that will take place in the next 10 years! It hurts my brain to think about it! I can't wait!

Sleepwalking

I did not miss the irony that this post following the one entitled Rest, is Sleepwalking :-) . . . however . . . 

Too many days I can find myself sleepwalking through life. I don’t want to do this for even one single day ever. When I find that I am drifting along, and it is getting more and more difficult to focus throughout the day, then I am falling into sleepwalking. I am embracing ALL that could possibly be done, rather than focusing on and celebrating that which is most important to be done. I means I gotta resharpen my “no” and eliminate all the noise in life. I cannot do it all. Shouldn’t even try at this stage of my life, because i know far far too well that I can and must do few things well, and the payoff is clarity. No more sleepwalking!

Rest

A much overlooked aspect of PTA and DTA is rest. I am not talking only about the over advertised part sleep plays in this subject, but just rest as a central part of a healthy life. Far too many people start to scratch their heads at this point, because they have no idea what I am talking about. They are so overrevved and overclocked that rest is something no longer remember from their childhoods. 

I am currently on a rest. I am at the beach with all my children and grandchildren and nieces and their kids, as well as my parent, and even my brother's ex-wife! I know I know, that does not sound restful at all. But it is, because I am not emailing, video-conferencing, twittering, facebooking, browsing, studying, reading, or working at all. Instead I am having great conversations with my adult children, telling stories to my grandchildren, getting a tons of hugs, body-surfing the waves (and yes I am so sore I can barely move - priceless) listening to my son howl with laughter (this is something everyone should experience in their lifetime) and listening to the huge roar of the winning team in any particular game, no TV's are on (there are 7 of them in this huge condo), no one is sitting around staring at their phone, ok very little compared to normal, and this my friends is rest. Not to mention the hours of sitting on the balcony watching the storms, sunsets and sunrises while rocking in a chair. This my friends is rest.