That’s it. In your corner, Mike PS: Hard doesn’t do it. Nor does nose-to-the-grindstone. Struggle certainly doesn’t do it. Be easy. Trust. Drop worries about the future or regrets about the past; we have no power then. All our power is here, now. At ease, we are open to better solutions, new ideas, […]
A man I met at a swim meet recently told me something enlightening. Whenever growing swimmers plateau in their performance–unable to go faster in race after race despite the effort–they are fighting the water. Their way of swimming pushes hard against the water and the water always wins. Same for us. As leaders who want […]
We all struggle from time to time for all sorts of reasons. Though most leaders aren’t trained as therapists, we are all very well trained as humans. Privately, matter-of-factly remarking to a team member that they seem to be struggling then listening without trying to fix or solve is a very good start. In […]
The sages tell us to have goals but not attach to them. They warn us that having too much focus on our goals comes from some subtle belief that achieving goals is difficult or impossible. That subtle belief promotes a struggle-laced busyness which makes goals difficult or impossible to achieve. But what to do instead? People who are successful […]
The secret is that the people we can help the most and best are the ones who struggle with the same things we struggle with. Wha..?! It’s true. We really understand the things we’ve been wrestling with. We learn as we struggle with anything like respect, money, connection, leadership, followership, self-worth, power, intelligence, happiness, love, […]
Wherever we continue to struggle with something, we will find a long history of our bad-feeling thinking about that something. This thinking will often be habitual; we would hardly notice we are thinking it. And we may even think it’s normal to have these bad-feeling thoughts about this issue. Bad feelings tell us we are […]
We interrupt your work day to bring you this special message. All that stress you’re running and all those tasks you’re doing right now? How’s that feeling? Right. It is awful. And how effective are you? Not as effective as you could be without the stress, yes? So, pause. Take this moment to just feel good. […]
Most days we waste a whack of time and energy. We struggle to figure out–and do first–the most important, urgent, due, or priority tasks. We really can’t see, amongst all the competing tasks, which are the most due-urgent-important. Attempts to rank tasks usually backfire. That calculus is too difficult. And we will always question if […]
Here are three work-life balance roadblocks and ways to clear them: We see “work” as something we struggle through. We see the grind, the guilt about tasks not yet done, the politics, the commute, the conditions, and everything we “have to do.” Instead, let’s choose to work from within our SweetSpots. Things happen with more ease […]
How are you feeling? Our sense of well-being, of feeling good is critical to our success. When we feel bad, the solutions we most need escape us. Our own habits of thought (and subsequent habits of behavior) plus the evidence we see all around us encourage us to struggle, to focus on what’s wrong, and […]