Tag Archives: books/magazines

Just to Be Enough

by on January 6, 2005 in Creative, Life, Media

I’m now back to the point where I can blog again. I traveled with my family to my parent’s home in West Virginia and then to Colorado to celebrate the end of 2004 with my wife’s family. Part of my wanted to take my laptop with me, but a more urgent voice asked me to leave it at home. I’m glad I did. I spent more time relaxing, reading provocative works, and most importantly, spending time with my wife and girls. I also started to sketch again – a creative outlet that I left dormant for too long. The challenge will be to continue these new habits as I return to familiar settings.

Off on a tangent…I’m a member of Toastmasters International. Each meeting there is an inspirational opener and for last night’s meeting a fellow coach read an excerpt from The Dance by Oriah Mountain Dreamer. The reading focused on the idea of "just being enough" and I was hit by some provocative questions and thoughts.

Our culture exalts the over-achiever, the individual who painstakingly achieves a high level of self-improvement, the person who rises from a log cabin to public greatness. Its our driving myth of accomplishment and its also a cult. Next time you’re at Barnes and Noble (or better yet, find an independently owned bookstore), take a look at all the books devoted to Self-Improvement. There are so many self-help gurus out there telling us we can be more: more confident, more loving, more outgoing, more wealthy, more thin…well, you get the picture. It’s all about more.

What if you and I are ENOUGH just as we are. Right now. We don’t need to be MORE. How does this change our reality? We have enough love, enough money, enough self-worth. We can stop chasing after the illusion that MORE offers. Our wholesale buying into the ideals of ambition and upward mobility have not led to greater happiness. Unfortunately, for most of us, just the opposite. But like the mouse in the wheel, we keep running forward only to be stuck in the same place we started.

As I further listened to the reading, I quickly wrote a question: is improvement the same as learning? The answer I came to is no. It is possible to accept that we are enough and continue to learn at the same time. Learn more about who we are, not who we should be or who others want us to be. It’s time to just grow to be enough.

Is It Luck or Something Deeper?

by on December 8, 2004 in Creative, Life, Media

I discovered this article on creating your own luck in career success and there were some ideas that resonated with me. Rather than viewing luck as a series of coincidences, Susan RoAne, author of How to Create Your Own Luck, believes it is a conscious pattern of thought: "People who create their own luck live large, remain open to possibility, and expect that good things will happen — and they do."

Similarly, in Manifest Your Destiny, Wayne Dyer writes:

The process of creation begins first with desire. Your desires, cultivated as seeds of potential on the path of spiritual awareness, can blossom in the form of freedom to have these desires in peace and harmony with your world. Giving yourself permission to explore this path is allowing yourself the freedom to use your mind to create the precise material world that matches your inner world.

We have the ability to create what we want from our lives. We also have the ability to wait around for things to happen. The choices are all ares to make. What choice do you want to make today?

Finding Your Voice

by on December 6, 2004 in Career, Creative, Media, Work

I seem to be very conscious of this notion of voice lately (see: What’s Your Voice from a few days ago).

I continue to be influenced by Stephen Covey’s work, but have yet to pick up his latest book, The 8th Habit. Based on this interview, I think maybe Santa could bring me a copy when he comes to visit later in the month (granted that he reads blogs and needs some additional ideas). Covey equates having a voice with a deeper connection to one’s work:

People have basically lost their voice. They’re alienated from their work. We’re in a knowledge age, yet our management principles are from the industrial age. They’re the authoritarian, command-and-control models. Just take the accounting system: It calls people an expense. Performance-appraisal systems are just repugnant to the dignity of people. You give them some nice words, slip in the knife and call that “areas for improvement” and then a few nice words at the end.

By the way, his 8th habit is: Find your voice and inspire others to find theirs.

Another article that caught my eye was one from Alaska about a sculptor named Sylvester Ayek who is trying to return to his Inupiaq roots.

Ayek says, he’s leaving Anchorage in pursuit of balance, something he can find only in the Bush. That’s where he finds solace, center and sustenance, a solitude in whose heart he regains equilibrium as he tries to maintain his footing in two worlds — worlds that continually pitch and roll beneath his feet. “If I’m in the city, I’m just an artist,” Ayek says. “But out there, I can be a hunter, fisher, gatherer and an artist. I get some sense of good order when I’m in nature, in the middle of nowhere, by myself.”

What struck me about this was the reminder that we are so much more than the labels that we attach to ourselves or those that we allow to be attached from others. In our work, we can be more than what a job description says. Once we have an idea of what our voice is, then its time to add another element to it.

Creating from Abundance

by on December 2, 2004 in Career, Creative, Life, Media

This week, I’ve been thinking about creating from a mind-set of abundance rather than from scarcity. There’s real power in this, but not always the easiest thing to do. One of my very favorite books is A Simpler Way by Margaret Wheatley and Myron Kellner-Rogers and they write:

Life creates more possibilities as it engages with opportunities. There are no ‘windows of opportunity,’ narrow openings in the fabric of space-time that soon disappear forever. Possibilities beget more possibilities; they are infinite.

There’s a certain peacefulness that comes from this knowledge. That the right clients, the right job opportunities, the right career, or whatever it is for us are always out there waiting for us to see them. And they are never alone – we always tend to attract more just like them. It might seem a little woo-woo, particularly in a business setting, but I believe there is a creative force that exists that successful leaders know how to tap into to get phenomenal results in their lives.

So, fellow explorers, any experiences with creating from abundance?

Wandering and Getting Unstuck

by on November 22, 2004 in Career, Media

A few weeks ago, I spoke to my college alumni group about my path to coaching and broke my story into three chapters. The opening chapter (yet, the one that continues to drive me) is called: Not all those who wander are lost. It’s from Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings and neatly encapsulates my professional experiences after graduating from college. While it has been scary at times, the act of conscious wandering has allowed me to remain open to possibilities that I may have missed if I was on a single track. For me, wandering is centered on being curious – about the world, other people, work and life. But while wandering unfortunately can be perceived as unfocused and frivolous, it can be a strength if connected to a set of core principles such as curiosity, adventure, learning. These are the things that keep a wanderer from getting lost or stuck (I hate being lost and I can’t stand being stuck).

When I finished speaking I distributed a handout with some quick ideas for getting "unstuck" which I think are useful for anyone feeling this way. They’re loosely based on ideas from the book Unstuck by Keith Yamashita and Sandra Spataro.

Idea #1: Clarify your Purpose
Before you get to the doing, figure out what drives you. Ask yourself: Why do you exist? What must you contribute in order to achieve not only success but significance? Make the task of defining your purpose an act that rejuvenates you. And remember to keep it brief: brevity creates even greater clarity.

Idea #2: Create YOUR Headline from the Future
Stories are powerful tools for generating energy and excitement. Create a newspaper headline from a future date. What will it say about all you have achieved? Now think: step by step, how will you get there?

Idea #3: Create a Haven for Free Thinking
Your environment holds great power over the way you think. If you’re stuck, find a place that’s new and claim it as your haven for free thinking. This could be a local park, a museum, a coffee shop. It should be a place that reignites your thoughts and imagination.

Any other ideas for getting unstuck out there?