The Precarious, Yet Necessary, Balancing Act of Social Media

A few years ago I made the decision to leave Facebook. This was a decision motivated mostly by the conclusion that unneeded drama is almost inevitable when sharing your life experiences on a social media site like that. It came after a point when there had been such conflict occurring in a couple major instances that I could no longer stand to let it be an avenue I would allow myself to go down, when conflict in "real life" seems hard enough to avoid the way it is. 

Now, truth be told, less than a year ago I made my way back into the world of Facebook. Before that, I'd been only found on LinkedIn as far as social media goes. The reasons that brought me back were equal parts sentimental and practical. I've enjoyed networking with new people and getting back in touch with many people of whom, without something like Facebook, unfortunately, I would surely have lost track. Primarily, though, Facebook: Round 2 has been all about me finding a way to be a positive voice in my world. 

During my hiatus from Facebook, I enjoyed knowing that if a person was going to have a problem with me, it was almost 100% inevitable that it was going to be from a face-to-face, real interaction, not a cyber-misunderstanding. There have still been a couple conflicts of that latter variety, because of an email or a text, but I've worked hard to eradicate those by either more careful use of email and text, or by trying to improve my people skills overall. 

But although my quest in my second life in Facebook has been one of intended harmony and positive influence, there have still been a couple of ruffled feathers. Now, frankly, part of me wants us all to agree that it's quite silly to be surprised by that. If you're going to use Facebook in the fullest, or even most of its, capacity (i.e. posting statuses of your own life or thoughts, commenting on others' posts of the same, sharing pictures, sending "PMs," or Personal Messages, etc)....well, then, feathers shall be ruffled once or twice because we are, after all, human. To err is human, right? And how does the rest of that go? "....But to forgive is divine." 

Then why in tarnation are we all so bad at being forgiving and gracious with each other on Facebook?

See, on the one hand, a large part of me loathes social media for its tendency to draw out the worst in human nature. We can be so fake on there, sometimes. We can be so nasty, and arrogant, and insensitive, and crude too. We somehow get it in our heads that things we'd never say to others face-to-face are just fine to say from the protection of an online social media account. We accept this part of the mini-culture of something like Facebook (and this all applies to Twitter and most of the others too, I'm just not on any of them, so this is the extent of my experience) as something that's socially acceptable, yet we'll post on Facebook itself at the same time about what nerve someone had to talk to us or act a certain way that we find ourselves treating each other all the time from behind our computer screens or cell phones. As a result of this, people are getting more socially disconnected in our modern world, even though seemingly more connected. 

But on the other hand, social media is what it is. And it's here to stay...at least for awhile. I'd like to believe that a day might come when we'll go through another renaissance of sorts and come full circle back to the ways things used to be when our communities were entirely flesh and blood, and the conversations were on porches, in town halls, pubs, and ball parks alone; when government was practiced by everyone in some level or another and everybody in a township or city knew what it was to gather and share in a real way. But that day is a long ways off, and even if we rebuild that element back into our social fabric, social media may be inextricably established because of technology and mankind's ability to continually believe the lie that lesser alternatives are OK when life gets us too busy for the real thing. After all, that's why we're on Facebook with our friends all night long all the time from miles away, but never see one another that often, isn't it??

So what are we to do with this paradox? And what are those of us to do, who value becoming leaders in our own lives, with the need for social media as an outlet for positivity? 

"Need???" you say? Well, alright, I admit that "need" is a strong word perhaps. But given that the times are what they are, and almost everyone from adolescence to the grave is online somewhere, if one is of the disposition to fight back in his own unique, little way against the cacophony of negative voices and information that bleeds its way into everything in life, don't we NEED to use every channel we can to push back with what's good?

That's my new philosophy nowadays, anyway. And so, that is [mostly] why I'm found on Facebook once again...for now. 

But this concession to be found on social media creates a leadership quandary. A conundrum. A Catch 22. A balancing act, to be sure.

It means that I have to somehow seek to be a regular presence in this social media world, adding my own personal value to it in the regular ways that others will agree with and be attracted to (hopefully), yet somehow keep myself away from the fray of drama and petty online behavior. If I'm a real leader-in-progress, a man hoping to become a beacon of influence and a proper model of how to build relationships and create an upright and enjoyable culture around myself, I cannot slip into the muck of what so many others seem content to spread in social media: hatred, slander, gossip, complaining and pity parties, and devaluation of timeless principles. Simply put, I need to have a mission to keep above all the drama, and certainly never to cause it. 

But alas, I still fail. Once in awhile, I forget who I'm really trying to be, and I take the risk of something like posting a comment to someone else's post that, in my mind, is harmless and makes a good point - a good, evangelical, I-stand-for-something kind of point. Maybe the timing was just wrong, maybe the word choice or lack of enough explanation was to blame. Maybe it was the perfect comment placed into the Facebook world of the wrong person. Maybe it was 6 and a half other possible reasons. But it led to someone being upset with me, telling me she was going to delete my comment (which a couple others had already liked, actually), and sharing her anger and disgust over how I was manifesting an attitude that belies a very large group of people with whom she apparently has come to take issue over the recent past. 

Now, wanting to be a leader, I chose to say no to the temptation inside to fight back and show umbrage, to defend my point, and tell her off for so unfairly lumping me into a group of people with whom I actually tend to take issue myself, in fact. After all, who was she to classify me like that, and act as if she knew exactly who I am today, when in reality we never interact that much on Facebook (interact far less in person, because we lives states apart) and she only truly knew me well back in high school and shortly after?

I kept all those offended and indignant thoughts to myself, pulled the weed of negativity, and realized that, even if there was only the tiniest shred of validity to her reason to be upset at me, I ought to make it right. "A leader always accepts the blame, so he or she can have the most participation in bringing about the solution," is what I've heard so many times in the past few years. So I apologized, acknowledged how she might feel that way from her perspective, and offered the possibility that I could've chosen different words. 

In the end, I don't know how much damage that was done - or was perceived to have been done - was actually fixed. But the point I'm making here is this:

If I've chosen to walk this precarious path in social media, where someone can get greatly upset with me over something I think would truly be handled better in person, then I need to be ready to absorb the blows that come with the territory. I can choose to handle them as lovingly and selflessly as I've been learning to handle real, face-to-face conflicts, rather than bemoan their presence in my life. They are, after all, conflicts I've allowed to become a possibility. 

It's either that, or I leave that part of my world behind again, and lose out on the opportunities to share my voice in all the encouraging, positive, leadership-oriented, and God-glorifying ways that I hope to have by staying in the fray. 

In the end, a life lived in the pursuit of excellence is not an aloof one. True leaders want to be an in-the-mix part of the world of which they're an inhabitant, and they embrace the challenges, and precarious, yet necessary, balancing acts that come their way in life. In order to fulfill a purpose of being a light in a dark world, and being a leader among people who will always need one, this is the game that must be played. 

And it's a game that must be played with grace for all - even those who have shown me none. I'm so far from perfect it's a laughable joke, but I just want to make a difference. 

So bring on the tightrope. 

The Folly of "The Quit"

 

The feeling of floundering in failure has led many a man (or woman) to give up on a pursuit that they once felt was worthy of their time and effort. We’ve all been there. Some of us have been there more than others.

What have you quit, or been tempted to quit, in your lifetime? A relationship with someone you loved but just couldn’t understand? A school program for a degree you wanted? A sport you wanted to excel in? A club or organization you felt you belonged in but that required too much of you and made you feel spread thin? A business venture? A job?

I listened to a success audio today (twice, it was that good!) by leadership expert Chris Brady, whose talk was titled, “Mastering Your Craft.” Although his talk was tailored to a specific business venture with its various tips and applications, he illustrated a powerful point that can – and should – be applied by anyone to any venture or undertaking. In my words, this is what his point was:

“Quitting something that’s worthy of your time and energy is very foolish.”

Sure, there’s things that no one would ever try to talk someone out of quitting, like smoking or drinking to excess, or reckless driving habits, or doing drugs….or even certain occupations or hobbies that aren’t always inherently bad, but might be for that person at that time.

What I’m talking about is giving up on a passionate pursuit. Giving up on something you once called a dream. Quitting something you shouldn’t quit.

As Chris Brady points out, there’s nothing wrong with a little experimentation as a child, adolescent, or even as a very young adult, while you figure out what pastimes or types of work you’re good at or would be passionate about doing as you grow up. But there comes a point in everyone’s life when it’s just time to master something. This is why the saying exists that one might be a “Jack of all trades, master of none.” Some people just never put all their eggs in one basket.

Why is this?

Certainly there can be many explanations for “The Quit.” At certain points in a person’s life they may quit something worthy for a variety of reasons, like being done in by a sinful pattern or an addiction, like messy relationships all around them that can’t be reconciled, like burn-out from overly fanatical behavior that wasn’t balanced by leisure or respite often enough. People might quit also because they’re forced out of something, like by life-threatening disease, a traumatic or time-consuming drama in their life with family, or things like that. Then there’s sometimes just a lack of courage, character, or will power to stay the course when you really should see that you owe it to yourself, and those aligned with you like a family or a team, to hang in there, push through, and not let your goal go unmet.

In his talk, Chris Brady put a little more specificity on why someone might quit something when they should’ve stuck with it. Maybe this won’t be applicable to every person in every degree of endeavor. But I’d wager that if more people took this idea to heart and applied it, there’d be less quitters-of-worthy-things out there in our society. Consequently, there’d be a lot more worthy causes being accomplished, a lot more things being done for the common good, and a lot of folks living happier, more fulfilled lives.

It goes like this: There’s a process of three main steps whenever you get into a venture.

-          Ignorance

-          Immersion

-          Intelligence

Chris describes how, in the ignorance phase, we’re filled with enthusiasm about something, and maybe there’s some instant early success with it, because you’re not even aware enough yet of how complex the thing is that you’re doing, and there’s less limiting beliefs about how to get it done.

The immersion phase is where it all gets real. This is when you start to realize in more depth what is all entailed in your career, your business venture, your hobby, your sport, your organization’s mission, etc…. In this phase the newness has worn off and you’ve begun to encounter the obstacles of your own limitations, your lack of full ability (which is inevitable, because everything requires mastery, which requires hard work), and adversity as the law of averages plays out more.

It’s in this immersion phase that a separation takes place. Here is where some, who lose courage and grow weary in pursuing excellence in what they’re doing, become tempted to quit. Yet some others don’t quit. When “The Quit” takes place, the massively unfortunate thing that Mr. Brady points out is that the quitter now has to start…all…over…again.

Quitting something worthy of your time and energy essentially makes waste of all the time and energy in your life that you already invested.

Therein lies the folly of the “The Quit.”

I believe that, although we cannot come to a sound faith in God on our own because of our fallen nature, spiritually, we CAN live out our lives themselves as a gift that’s FULL of choice opportunities. Once you realize your one main purpose in life to be fulfilled (and that’s a topic for another time, to be best covered by men and women far wiser than I) you owe it to yourself, and the world you’re here to bless, to just decide on mastering whatever distinct venture you’ve set your mind to.

If it’s to be a pastor or missionary out seeking the spiritually lost around the world, don’t quit! If it’s to be a teacher, a home builder, a physician, a high level executive of a great company that offers a wonderful service or product, don’t quit! If it’s to gain a political office to bring about positive change in society, don’t quit! If it’s to be an entrepreneur who wants more than the average amount of free time to invest in family, travel, charitable giving, and educating others on what you’ve done in the business world, then DON’T QUIT! Don’t spend your life second-guessing the validity of what you once committed to! Stay the course.

The problem with staying the course within this aforementioned immersion phase, is that it’s a stage that’s jam-packed with tough experiences. You’re well beyond the initial excitement. Your rosy-colored glasses have cracked and fallen off your face, and you see all that’s ugly, tough, or sometimes unpleasant about the tasks. You also begin to tire of seeing all that’s ugly, tough, or unpleasant about YOURSELF.

It’s at this critical juncture, when you feel like you’re in over your head, drowning, overwhelmed, inundated….that you must reach down deep for extra strength, because pushing on is of highest importance.

[For the greatest – or, in my opinion, only – source of strength within, by the way, I humbly propose seeking the one true God, who has promised to give unending reserves of strength and courage for any worthy or righteous undertaking.]

After pushing through the adversity, the getting-real-with-yourself moments, and the challenges of the learning curve needed for mastery, you arrive somewhere that makes it all worthwhile. It’s a place that is a destination yet untouched by my feet on my personal journey, but of which I can speak with glowing terms because of the powerful testimony of others who have reached theirs.

This last phase is called the intelligence phase. In this stage of the game, you’ve finally come through the woods. You’ve spent enough hours practicing, playing through the games of your sport, and making adjustments ruthlessly with yourself so you could achieve your goals. You’ve created enough masterpieces of art, you’ve launched enough well done and dazzling performances or projects. You’ve delivered on enough effectively constructed contracts in your industry. You’ve conquered the competition, put in enough time learning, and most importantly, applied it all over and over and over again, in real time, never being satisfied with “good enough.” You’ve sweated, cried, bled, prayed endlessly over someone or something, and left nothing out there but your best. After enough time in that immersion phase, you now have an intelligence, or a competence, that comes quite naturally. And that, my friends, brings a satisfaction that nothing can touch.

But to feel the sands of that perfect beach of intelligence and competence in whatever undertaking you’ve chosen, you HAVE TO swim the miles of ocean, dodge the sharks, and refuse the life boats that row past with someone offering a floatation device - - - a way out.

Believe that it’s worth it. Understand that, with the right source of strength and the right support, and with enough courage, you can, and must push through and kick and struggle and paddle in the drowning sensation of the immersion phase.

If you quit, it’ll be the most foolish thing. As Chris Brady has said elsewhere, “Quitting is a permanent solution to a temporary problem.”  Those who quit one thing only risk starting an endless, spiraling pattern in life, that will never allow them to find fulfillment, happiness, or success.

How can one survive the lure of quitting when the immersion phase becomes so strong?

Chris Brady’s recommendation is this:

Make one very critical, very character-forming decision: Will you deflect all the pressure onto someone or something else? Or will you take all that pressure and overwhelm from your challenges, and place it on yourself, and leverage it into motivation to change and improve?

To say it again, you can survive immersion in whatever you’re doing, and arrive at mastery/intelligence/competence, by taking all the pressure and putting it onto yourself.

Orrin Woodward, another great leadership mind of our times, has put it this way: “You either hate changing enough to lose, or you hate losing enough to change.” Which one of those are you?

If you quit when you should just push through, starting over is so foolish because you’re choosing to believe a lie. What’s the lie? It’s the ever popular saying that seems to arise everywhere, “It’s never too late.”

FALSE. THERE IS A “TOO LATE.”

It can be too late when you’ve blown out enough relationships in your life that you’re left alone and have to spend your remaining years trying to win them all back or just end up bitter and crabby. It can be too late when you’ve resorted to something so reckless or desperate that you wind up in prison. It can be too late when you’ve let addictions overtake you. It can be too late when you’ve thrown away a marriage or your family life. It can be too late when your habits ruin your health. It can be too late when you’ve gotten yourself blacklisted out of whatever circles you wanted to live in for a profession.

It’s too late when you’re dead.

And that day, by the way, could be tomorrow.

Quitting ensures that you lose out on the opportunity to be passionately engaged in the hunt for whatever purpose you’ve chosen to fulfill. And when you’re not under that pressure anymore, you risk dying in a state of lethargy, pointlessness, and misery. We are our happiest and most content when we know we’re getting after something that’s worthwhile.

So don’t allow the challenges, drama, mundane details, or lies of the Evil One to convince you to quit something that you just need to push through because it’s temporary. Keep kicking those legs, and swim all the way through the drowning sensation until you reach the surface. Become a master swimmer, so you can accomplish your purpose, and along the way, lead as many others as possible through their difficult times, so they too can achieve excellence and significance, and bring a smile to the face of their Maker.

DON’T QUIT!!

Stop Being a Victim, Go Be a Victor

Tonight I dare to comment on a topic that used to be very much meant for my ears. I think the majority of people bothering to read a blog like mine will already have a little better understanding, though it's the Everyday Joes and Janes of society, with whom we all interact, that I really want to speak to.

Let me just state a truth about our country that far too few seem to understand anymore: We live in a free enterprise society - NOT a socialist one!

This may seem obvious to most everyone, but what's unfortunate about many today is that we are a people who are often well educated, but highly misinformed. Coworkers, people I rub shoulders with in public, maybe even a friend or relative....so many fooled into thinking we should all be on level ground. 

When I say "we," substitute for "the poor, middle class, and wealthy alike." 

As hard as it may be to do so, dismiss for a few moments the knowledge we all so intimately share (or like to think we do, because the media and movies are always credible sources) that all the wealthy are crooked or were born with a silver spoon in their mouths. If you put that aside, you can entertain the thought that there is a nobility and admirable quality to how wealth and success is often obtained. Many of the wealthiest in America (or around the world, for that matter) got where they are now after VERY humble beginnings. In fact, in light of Bastiat's Law, it can be understood that most of those who have achieved that status and kept it did so more often than not through toil and valuable life lessons, not through overnight magic or from inheritance. Bastiat's Law, often quoted by leadership expert Orrin Woodward as one of his noted "Five Laws of Decline," is simply put, that whenever plunder is available along with hard work as contemporary choices, human nature is liable to take plunder. 

In other words, if you have to earn it the hard way, it's easier to do things the crooked way. 

And in still other words, by extension, if you earned it through doing things the hard way, you appreciate it and treat it right. 

I will definitely concede that there are many juggernaut company tycoons, wealthy back-pocket-stuffing politicians, and others who didn't achieve wealth or success by the noblest of means. But what drives me crazy is the haste with which so many around me in this day and age seem to cast the net of generality over ALL wealthy people, defaulting to a position of disdain. 

But let's call it like it is. If we're really honest with ourselves, we know that there are some of them who got where they are by honest, hard fought, long-hours kind of living for many years to have the results that become known to the public eye. And what usually parades as disdain is an underlying envy of those people - that they figured out how to beat this gosh-awful, savage game in life, the battle against an economy, and the rules of conventional income-earning, to emerge victorious. 

So what I'm saying tonight is: Stop being a victim, and go figure out how to be a victor in the game. 

I have worked many hours in retail or other settings where I got to service the elderly generations. I often wonder what they're thinking as they go through these latter years of life in a society that has become so completely soft and whiny. Many of us have grandparents or great grandparents, or maybe even parents, who valiantly risked their lives or gave them up altogether in ugly warfare, for the protection of our rights and liberties in this land of the free and home of the brave. 

Only now they probably listen to the conversations, eye up the slumped postures and sagged clothing, and bear witness to petty and lazy behavior, and think, "Brave? What brave?" We applaud those who step out and get a second job - when they could really stick to one if they just made better financial choices - like THEY'RE some kind of heroes and hard working icons. 

How about this? Take that victim card...you know you have one...and rip that puppy up and chuck it in the nearest fire. 

Playing the victim card is one's way of handing over all ability or opportunity to do something to change the current reality. 

Dear fellow citizen, whether you realize it or not, the United States of America is still the greatest place to live where opportunity exists. It's an ever fleeting reality, as we continue to allow our ballooning and ungodly government to sneak our freedoms out from under us. But it's still true that if you really want a different set of circumstances, you CAN go out there and get them! 

It's going to take a radical change in your thinking, though. A change process that I myself, through the influence and mentorship of entrepreneurs in the past few years, have only begun to skim the surface of. But it's worthy of your time and effort. You need to seek out those who appear to have the fruit on the tree that you wish your little sapling had to show for itself. Don't shun or think morally less of those who have accomplished something. They may actually have something to teach you. There's lessons that don't end up being learned from school curriculums, about self-respect, discipline, integrity in dealings, how to influence others and win them over to your way of thinking for the common good... There's lessons about how to be shrewd with your finances, and practice delayed gratification instead of having everything your whims lean toward in the now. There's even some of these folks who can help you grow your faith, so you know how true wealth is really found, and how to balance ambitions with grounded priorities, to keep values at heart, and keep ones intentions in check. 

But all these things have to be learned. They don't flow into us from video game consoles. They don't come to us as a rebate from the bar after running up so high a tab in so many consecutive weekends of partying. They don't enter into our minds on accident. 

Don't bemoan the wealthy or successful. Don't call it unfair. Unfair is what it would be if we were all forced to make a living by beating LeBron James in one-on-one every week (well, at least for people like me, and 98% of the rest of the regular population). Once you come to understand and appreciate not only how much opportunity truly exists out there in our country, for those who are truly hungry and creative, but also how wealth is earned and maintained, you simply can't keep playing that victim card. 

The truth is, dear fellow 21st century American citizen, you have it inside you. Your intellect is sufficient, and you have enough of your own personal, unique brand of genius that was infused into you at birth, to accomplish great things. You can have a fantastic, well-rounded lifestyle that can be the envy of others who also don't get it. You can climb the right kind of ladder to whatever heights you wish, if you'll only humble yourself to see the vanity in cutting others down. 

You, my friend, can be a victor. Don't be a victim. Define what you want you life to actually look like - and place no boundaries or limits on that painting in your mind. Then be willing to go seek out those who have results you want in your future. Then learn from them. Copying was verboten in school, but in adulthood, anyone from Richard Branson to John Maxwell, from Jeff Bezos to [the late] Steve Jobs, from Bill Gates to Mark Zuckerberg -- they'll all tell you that copying is the best way to ensure you climb to the heights you're truly wishing for. 

So stop the wishing. Stop the envying. Stop the disdain. The victim card will get you no further than where you are right now. Go be a victor. Chase down your own personal victories. They are more than within your grasp if you're willing to fight for them. 

Then, one day, when the tables are turned and you're enjoying the spoils of your toils, you'll be hoping all the Everyday Joes and Janes (like what you used to be) don't loathe you, because you'll know that if they do, they just don't know the whole story. 

Time Really IS Money

I would like to respectfully disagree with what I’m sure is countless thousands of people, if not millions, who have ever said, “Time is money!” Sometimes this expression is used by people whose lives really are lived by the standards of a demanding time-for-money trade (which, suggested by statistics by economists like Robert Kiyosaki, makes up about 95% of all people in America). In these cases you’ll hear it used by, say, a businessman who is keenly aware of a deadline, telling a subordinate, “C’mon Johnson, I need that proposal on my desk yesterday! They’re being submitted to Smith on the 12^th and we’re still behind! Time is money!”

For anyone who earns a living in what are called the “E (Employee)” and “S (Self-employed)” areas of the “Cash Flow Quadrant (again, something coined by Robert Kiyosaki)” there is a real element of truth to that expression. Such types, including me at this point in my life, and millions of others, do live out a veritable trade of their time for their money as they give away 8, 10, 12 or more hours per workday in exchange for the pay from their employers. Self-employed people tend to do this more on a task/project-for-payment basis, not so much hourly, but the principle is the same.

“Time is money” quoters, whether they really mean it or are just saying it loosely because they’ve heard it before, are really reflecting a powerful reality of life for many who will remain subject to it: you can’t have all the time and money you want. Those with true wealth will tell you that you don’t have it (i.e. wealth) unless you have both of its components: money AND time. But this is more of a topic for another time.

Let me clarify what I meant in my first statement.

I don’t disagree with the reality that, for some, time is money. I disagree that it ought to be that way. When it comes to the economic state of your life, there are other means to wealth that aren’t obtained in the traditional “income” parameters that most live by. Entrepreneurs, a dying breed these days, due to the shrinking presence of free thinkers in our society, and in part because of the oppressive impact of a regulation-happy government, will tell you that a system using duplication and leverage of combined efforts is a better, more efficient path to money and lifestyle.

But enough of that. That’s all still a topic for another time.

My real contention with the expression in question today is because the sentence is written wrong. Orrin Woodward, in his best-seller Resolved: 13 Resolutions for LIFE, speaks of the importance of time-management. His comments in chapter 1 of his book, discussing the idea of purpose in life, led me to the realization that the expression should really go like this:

“Treat time like it’s money.”

Woodward says,

“In order to live a life of purpose, a person must learn to focus his time on purpose. Time is the stuff that life is made of, making time-management a crucial skill. But developing effective time-management without directing it towards one’s purpose is to efficiently manage the wasting of one’s life.”

At first, that last sentence sounds awfully strong. But consider a quote from later in the same passage, where Woodward references Hyrum Smith in The Ten Natural Laws:

“Time is just like money. When you decide to spend one hour watching TV, you have also decided not to spend the time on what? Everything else (emphasis added). You would be very upset if someone gained access to your bank account and sole all your money. Most people, though, don’t blink an eye when all sorts of culprits sneak into their lives and steal their time.”

So in other words, not practicing good time-management is like having no security system and no vault for the bank of your life’s time. In fact, when you think of how often we’re seeking out or falling passively for the lure of “time thieves,” we may as well add a doorman to that picture too, who’s standing outside waving every shady character inside the door to the bank. I don’t know about you, but I know I have definitely wasted a lot of time in my life. This portion of Woodward’s book really was a gut-punch.

The idea here is also not only that time-management itself is critical; that simply results in productivity. I agree with Orrin Woodward, that purposeful productivity is what’s desirable – in other words, accomplishments that point you toward your personal purpose, or, put another way, the thing God made you to do. After all, like Henry David Thoreau said, “It is not enough to be busy. So too are the ants.”

Ever feel like you’ve spent an entire day, or worse, an entire week, running around like crazy, doing this, doing that, and by Friday or Saturday (whichever is more your personal wind-down time) you find yourself thinking What the heck did I even do this week? What did I accomplish? I’m wiped out and I don’t feel satisfied!

Whenever you feel this way, it’s your soul telling you that you may have wasted some or much of your time. Maybe there were a lot of urgent things to do, or things you had seemingly no choice but to do. But were they all important? Were they all necessary for taking another step towards fulfilling your distinct purpose?

If you’re anything like me, you’ve probably had to admit to yourself that days and weeks go by when the answers to those questions didn’t sit too well. We know deep down that we’re here on Earth for something bigger. That’s unique to you, the individual. We’re not all here for the exact same purpose. Socrates said, “The unexamined life is not worth living.” Maybe we should examine our lives, and ourselves, more often. Are we checking our current reality against what that subtle voice always lingering within is telling us about what we feel called to do with our time here?

“But Jeff,” you tell me, “There are so many things on my plate. They all have to go somewhere!” To that I respond, yes and no. No, not everything has to go on your plate. Use a filter on everything that presents itself for time expenditure: Will ______________ get me closer to my purpose / help me live my purpose today? If so, excellent! Keep it in your list to be prioritized towards your purpose. If not….I’m afraid you have to chuck it! If you don’t, you will waste your time.

Think of it objectively. Remember: “Treat time like it’s money!” Let’s pretend for a moment that the currency value of our dollar was much higher than it is. Then we’ll pretend that every hour of a day is like a dollar. So there’s 24 of them to be spent as wisely as possible each time we cross 12:00 a.m. If you had to shell out a dollar for every hour doing the things you do on a consistent basis, knowing you only had 24 to work with til you’re broke, would you be ok with that? I imagine many of us would be more frugal with what we would do with those hours. Maybe they’d get spent more often on playing with the kids, doing something to have quality time with a spouse, reading something of value (the Bible, history, economics, poetry, or whatever keeps you feeling informed in a sensible way, or mentally stimulated), exercising, being out building a business, volunteering time at church or for a charity, working on a hobby like sewing or wood-carving, etc. But no, how do so many hours get spent when we’re not working, sleeping, eating, or doing necessary housework? Facebook, Twitter, reality TV shows, video games, going to the bar….These are the usual time thieves because, while ok or good in small doses, they don’t have a quality about them that generally gets us closer to our true purpose in life.

My proposal is: Treat time like it’s money. You walk around each day with a fistful of time-dollars. When you encounter something, will you hand over the dollar and go about that thing because it’ll leave you satisfied and purpose-bound, or will you shake your head and motion for it to move on til another time?

For additional, far wiser encouragement on how to discern how best to spend those hours each day, I highly recommend a book called First Things First, by the late Steven Covey. In brief, what he outlines is something a lecturer once taught a crowd with: He put a large jar on the table on the stage and put some fist-sized rocks into it until it was full. When asked if the jar was full, the crowd shouted, “Yes!” But he went on to show the crowd how, since he had started with the big rocks first, there was still actually space left to pour in gravel, then sand, and then even water, to ultimately truly fill the jar.

Use this “Big Rocks First” philosophy with your time-management. Approach each tomorrow with thoughts of what’s most important (big rocks), that needs most attention. Proceed in order of importance, and you’ll find room for the rest accordingly. But most importantly, you’ll put your head on your pillow each night knowing the truly important things – maybe even your true purpose itself – were accomplished that day, and you spent your time-dollars wisely.

            “The heights by great men reached and kept

            Were not attained by sudden flight

            But they, while their companions slept,

            Were toiling upward in the night.”

-          Henry Wadsworth Longellow

(quote from Resolved: 13 Resolutions for LIFE, chapter 1)

Re-solving How to Resolve

So it’s a new year - 2014. A blank canvass upon which to paint a new masterpiece. A new chapter to write with fresh ink. An adventure to be lived, with all new twists and turns of excitement to experience.

Ok, you can stop stifling your “I-hate-cheesy-clichés” laugh and eye rolls. I know what you’re thinking. I think it too.

Life is rarely the made-for-TV-movie script we wish it were. We rarely have those stellar years. Every time we make a resolution it ends up as broken as last year’s. According to an article on Forbes.com, in fact, only 8% of people achieve their resolutions.

 http://www.forbes.com/sites/dandiamond/2013/01/01/just-8-of-people-achieve-their-new-years-resolutions-heres-how-they-did-it/

The exact numbers in statistics don’t really matter. After all, everyone knows that precisely 36.8% of all statistics are made up anyway….. (wait for it….THERE ya go!) The point is, so few people actually set official new year’s resolutions, and even fewer keep them.

I’m here today to simply encourage you to do so, and really give it a go this year. Whether they’re to be called resolutions of the “New Year’s” variety, or just resolutions you’ve been wanting to make awhile now and, well, now’s just the best time (“No time like the present!” they say).

After all, we used to be a country of resolution-makers. But not so much anymore. The media world programs a lesser standard of moral and civil interest into anyone who's got a TV or radio. We've become a hyper-paced, technologically over-stimulated, entertainment-mongering society. And we're busier than ever. But doing what? Think of what generally comprises our time nowadays. Aside from work and sleep, the average person has probably less than 6 or 7 hours of a day to pack in all the rest of what they have on their plate. After factoring in caring for children, preparing and eating meals, and all the other even more trivial things that occur daily or multiple times daily, there’s so little time left for what we want to do with our lives that we tend to live out very happenstance existences.

But we should live on purpose. We should have goals. If I don’t set a goal for where I want to be down the road….I’m already there. Depending on which area of my life we’re talking, that can be downright depressing!

Let’s get one other thing out of the way right now, too: I know I’m not an expert on resolutions by any stretch. My wife will attest (if she has to) to the fact that I leave things undone – intentions included. Of course we all do. But I think a new year does provide an appropriate dogear to a page of one chapter of life where it can’t hurt to put a foot down and create a new course for oneself. That’s what I’ve made up my mind to do in 2014.

When I sat down to create my list of resolutions, I initially thought that 1 big one would do nicely. But how to settle on just one thing was really daunting. Of course, creating a massive, never-ending list can certainly seem a mountain too. I wound up deciding on 8 resolutions. I borrowed from a knowledge of 8 categories of life that I’m familiar with, that, to me, comprise all of my existence. Within each of those 8 main categories, I then chose a way to be specific in the phrasing of the resolution. Along with that came a need to use distinct action words, so that there’d be no vagueness about how I’d accomplish it. To be honest with you, while I’d mentally come up with resolutions before, I’ve never written (or typed) it out before. This year I did. Here’s what I came up with:

§         I resolve to walk closer to my Savior and grow in His wisdom through reading the Scriptures.

§         I resolve to become a model family man by becoming a more nurturing father, a more loving husband, and an able captain of my household.

§         I resolve to establish habits that will produce better health and body image, to have more energy, look fitter, and be more productive.

§         I resolve to manage my personal finances more responsibly to enable myself to bless my family and others with whatever wealth God gives.

§         I resolve to become a better advocate for freedom through educating myself on the principles and history of what once made America great, and can again.

§         I resolve to become a true leader in all areas of life, through reading the right books, listening to the right inputs, and associating with other leaders, and then implementing it all into action. I can and MUST make a difference and leave a lasting legacy for the next generation!

§         I resolve to become a better friend, by taking ownership of all my relationships, seeking only win-win situations, and making Christ-like deposits into others’ lives whenever possible.

§         I resolve to gain a healthier view of fun and entertainment: to allow myself leisure for the purpose of introspection, to use play and recreation as a recharging of my battery for chasing my purpose, and to bring more joy to my life and make someone else’s day.

Is that a lengthy, and perhaps overly-thorough, list of resolutions? Maybe. But let me remind you that I had to be very intentional with the list, so that vagueness wouldn’t lead to inaction. Specificity always gives greater enlightenment as to how to move forward.

With the “what” of resolutions decided, and their presence made more real in my life by having written them down (and I’ll probably post several copies around my house to serve as reminders), the biggest concern that remains is: HOW? How do they get accomplished.

First of all, I’m trying to keep the healthy view of it all, that any progress in these areas is going to be a win. Books like The Slight Edge by Jeff Olson (http://slightedge.org/) talk about how simply taking little steps in the right direction have a residual effect that leads to a win. What’s the best (and probably only) way to eat an elephant? One bite at a time. So even if I only get slightly better in all of these areas this year, that’s still better than sliding backwards in those areas, which The Slight Edge describes WILL happen if you don’t take positive action forward. There is only progress or regression, there’s no staying the same.

Which leads to the next point. How can I know whether I’m getting better or coming closer to achieving a resolution? All great leadership experts teach on how important the scoreboard is when trying to be excellent. If you set up no measuring standard for yourself, you allow your own natural self-deception to guide you into mediocrity (at best) or failure (at worst). So there has to be some quantifiable way of gauging or judging one’s progress. That’s for you to decide. But be honest with yourself. The best goals are things that are just a bit out of reach. George Guzzardo, a leadership expert who mentors with Orrin Woodward (the #6 leadership guru in the world), says “Vision must be believable but border on the unbelievable.” So have vision for where you want to be in a given area, and make it bold, but achievable with a good stretch. You want to know you overcame some things to get it, but also not be downtrodden if you miss it by a mile because it wasn’t truly attainable.

Within goal-setting we find probably the greatest amount of difficulty. I’m not going to get terribly nitty-gritty here because, as I’ve already readily admitted, I’m no resolutions expert. What I’ve learned about aiming for something and then going after it is all material that I’ve found elsewhere. An excellent book that can help you really take hold of this whole idea is called Resolved: 13 Resolutions for LIFE by best-selling author Orrin Woodward. You can even find a personal development program – something kind of like P90X for your mind – called the Mental Fitness Challenge (http://www.mental-fitness-challenge.com/), which has modules based off 3 leadership books, of which Woodward's book is one. Chapters 5 and 6 are extremely helpful on this topic of gameplanning and executing.

Finally, the biggest thing about resolutions is your “Why.” As you sit and think with eyes closed about the “new you” in whatever area your resolution(s) fall(s) (and visualization is a huge key to accomplishing your goal – just ask any pro athlete, Olympian, etc), what is ultimately driving you?

For me, it’s my faith. Rather, it’s the object of my faith. I don’t want my blog to be about pushing my brand of faith on anyone else, but to me there’s an undeniable connection between one’s spiritual foundation and their motivation in life. I personally aim to become a better, healthier, more loving, more highly functional, leadership-heavy individual because I believe I can give glory to my God that way. He has given me a life that is incredible and I’m unworthy of it all. He has prospered me despite my wanderings and blaspheming behavior. He has loved me with good fortunes, the surroundings of loving people, and most importantly by promising a permanent address in heaven after my time’s up here on Earth.

My life, and everything I aim to do and do well, is a thank offering for me. Just like ancient people used to sacrifice things to their deities (the people of Israel did, to the now Judeo-Christian God) on altars, so I lift up my life, my humble efforts, along with my failings, and place it on a pyre and light it up, so the smoke signals and aromas of my performance show “fruit on the tree” that I’m a real believer and not a pretender. That is my ultimate motivation.

Secondary to that – and also tremendously important – is the blessing I hope that achieving these resolutions brings to everyone around me. Many of these resolutions have to do with others directly, and I want to be a better me for them too. Only instead of their benefit or approval being my only motivation, it’s more of a byproduct.

Ultimately, whether you find faith like mine as your starting point for any of this, I most of all want to encourage you to try out the approach I’m trying out this year, to knock resolutions out of the park. It’s been a bane in many people’s existence, but it’s a problem that can be solved. Maybe one to be re-solved.

I wish you the best in becoming your best!

Oh, and….Happy New Year. 

Underappreciated

I was recently listening to a leadership talk on CD by Chris Brady, and one of his passing quotes was "What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly." He was quoting Thomas Paine, an 18th century English-American political activist. Although Chris' quoting of Paine was merely an expounding of a sub-point of his overall theme in the talk, I immediately had to jot it down for its profundity.

Looking it up and reading a little further on Thomas Paine, I found that the whole quote originally went like this:

"What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly; it is dearness only that gives everything its value."

I can really appreciate this quote because, first of all, it applies to so much in life - arguably to everything in life, if you think about it. For example, the 16 year old whose parents buy him/her their first car right after they've obtained their driver's license, can't appreciate that car (whether a Mustang or a "rust bucket") as much as they would if they'd worked hard for a summer, saved up the cash and delayed their gratification, and then purchased the car of their choice - in their price range. Another example is, frankly, me in regards to my wife. What I mean is, as I've often told her, after spending virtually all of my dating years seemingly chasing after gals I desired, and bending over backwards to please them and retain their affections, one day in 2008 she walked into my life and I needed to do nothing to win her over. I have always feared that, for all these years since, I might underappreciate her because I hadn't had to strive to "win" or "obtain" her or her love. The fact that you don't necessarily have to struggle and scratch and claw to obtain a spouse's loyalty - when God's goodness can take care of that - is a topic for another time. But the fact that, generally speaking otherwise, mankind values that which he labored for more deeply, is the topic here.

The ultimate example, or application, I want to draw attention to in light of Thomas Paine's quote, is our freedom as Americans.

Thomas Paine's quote highlights (and probably, when he first said it, purposely foretold) how free Americans of each subsequent generation stand to lose more ground than those before them in the battle to stay fully appreciative of the freedoms our country enjoys. Anyone who's spent considerable time over in a third world or war-torn country doing mission work will confirm this when they come home. Anyone who served in the armed forces or simply lived during the Greatest Generation in the World War II era will bemoan this. Simply put, if you didn't earn it, you can't appreciate it enough. To any who want to shrug off responsibility for that truth in their own life, because of facts they can't change (like "But I wasn't even alive until long past those years!"), well -- we can still try!! We can still study those times. We can still study the founding generation, their efforts, their values, etc. We can still make our freedom a subject of concern and common conversation, as if it still matters greatly now, just as it did then when it was still being earned or "obtained."

21st Century Americans are wusses. Plain and simple. And that includes me. Maybe some of us have had difficult family lives and have been toughened by poverty by our country's standards. Maybe others of us have served in the armed forces recently - or still do - and you would be exempt from this because you have seen what it's like to pay a price for your country's freedom, and if so, I and millions in our country thank you sincerely and wish you could be more highly esteemed. But maybe who I'm mostly directly speaking to as I write this is anyone in my generation, or the one immediately before, or certainly the one(s) immediately following. The founding generations....the American settlers who established the territories and cultures of our country....and most recently the generation that makes up our grandparents and great grandparents, didn't know anything of X-Box, iPads and iPhones, DVD players in the backs of headrests in cars, microwaves, or the prevalence of fast food and delivery pizza and subs. They earned their rights as adults in society. They earned their living through hard work (most of the time much harder than the average American has to work nowadays). They purchased things only when they truly deserved them and had earned them, not when they simply wanted them and a bank had told them they could afford X amount of credit for them. And, speaking of the very freedom of our country itself over 200 years ago, they had the utmost freedom and liberty to live as they wanted only when they had truly earned it - only when enough had stood up and argued for it, or had bled and died and sacrificed for it. Not a moment sooner or a dollar less.

I and the vast majority of my countrymen of our latest generations are a laughing stock by comparison. We haven't had to put anything on the line for the freedoms we enjoy still to this day. The majority of us aren't ever called on  explicitly to serve and protect to keep it that way. And even worse, the majority of us still complain and take it all for granted, while through our arrogance and ignorance to how politics really works we just let freedom continue to be taken out from under our noses.

Maybe we can't, or don't have to, sacrifice our lives in blood to put an end to the losses. But how much better would it all be if we banded together, each in our own way, to learn more about the history of our freedom, and what we can do individually and collectively to preserve it? How much better can it be if, instead of our gazes being fixed downward right on our own sacred little plot of ground and time that we're renting (cuz let's face it, we're renting our time from God Almighty, and for most of us our property or homes are rented from the bank - true ownership doesn't exist these days), we look only backward and forward. Backward in thankfulness and appreciation of what others have done to obtain what we have now, and forward in resolve to preserve it all ourselves in whatever way we can so our children and theirs can still enjoy it. History has proven for every other people who were ever free, that if any generation keeps looking downward at themselves, they hasten the day of their freedom loss.

"But Jeff, you don't understand how busy I am..." Yes I do. I am too. Are we too busy to scrimp on a little TV watching, video-game playing, deer-hunting, or hauling kids back and forth from every imaginable peewee league to dedicate time to educating ourselves and our families on the things that will keep freedom alive? Are we too busy with pleasing ourselves and rewarding ourselves for our own hard work that we can't spare a night here or there to volunteer somewhere or show up at local city council meetings or make our (educated) votes known? "Things ain't what they used to be," many of us cry out. That's right, because "used to be" that every citizen, young and old, made a point to gather regularly and discuss the hard things and challenges of the times, to collectively decide again and again on who to keep things headed in the right direction on the local level, so that we all could, as townships, counties, and states, hold the federal government accountable. Why don't we do that anymore? What would happen if we got it back?

Please understand that I don't write to you as George Washington reincarnate, or even as present-day freedom fighters Oliver DeMille or Stephen Palmer (please see http://www.thesocialleader.com/blog/ for true inspiration on all of this). I write to you as someone whose personal economic freedom isn't such yet that i can contribute as much to the solutions as I want to. I'm also someone whose own lazy excuses still get in my way too often. But I want to be that voice of encouragement that says to everyone, "Let's let our efforts rise above our excuses and get busy KEEPING freedom!!"

We may not have "obtained" all that we have and know in our current level of freedom. But we can absolutely strive to live in appreciation and protection of what we "esteem," and make sure that its "dearness" runs deep in each of our homes!

As another Veteran's Day approaches, thank you, God, for those who have served and fallen in the name of American freedom, and thank you for the opportunity in each of our lives, to bring back what is being lost!

Book Cover Judgments

Have you ever found yourself perplexed over how tricky it can be to accurately size people up from first impressions? I'm not referring to the thought Hey, I have no idea what to make of this person. They're hard to read. No, I mean, how futile it is to trust our initial judgments of the cover of the book that is the new acquaintance.

Have you ever caught yourself having to backtrack from your original impression? Isn't it interesting how we so naturally and fluidly can amend an original favorable impression of a person with a newfound negative label, yet it's so very hard to admit to ourselves when we've mislabeled someone negatively and have to backtrack to relabel them positively?

I've found myself in this position a couple times recently with new coworkers. In two somewhat strikingly opposite cases I know I was wrong about someone from first impressions, and then I had to learn how to view that coworker in an opposite light than what I first thought was the one shining on them. Coworker #1 I was convinced might be a very humble, encouraging, easy-going individual who could be worth reaching out to with an invitation to partner with me in my leadership development group. When the invitation was officially extended, the reaction given and my initial treatment afterward proved me quite wrong on many of those assumptions. I won't say he's a bad person; it's just that I was probably incorrect about some of the good qualities in specific that I thought he had. Then coworker #2 was the stark opposite experience. Again, not to say that I've come to find that he's actually the most humble, agreeable, positive influence and a "10 percenter" extraordinaire. But I was wrong in my initial judgment, and labels of haughtiness, arrogance, and other things were probably too harshly ascribed - certainly he's not those things to the levels of depth that I first thought.

What does this teach us? What has it taught me, yet again? Well, of course, the old adage that we can't "judge a book by its cover" is profoundly true. In fact, it's so true that we may stand to consider that we're very often completely wrong when assuming someone belongs so far into one end of a label spectrum, and people are sometimes the total opposite of what we first think.

But more than that, I think this reinforces an invaluable lesson in leadership: At all times, look for the good in others around you. Sure, there are settings where this is easier than in others, but, as Orrin Woodward describes in his famous recording of a leadership talk, "Lens Effect," we only set ourselves up for failure in making a positive influence on our surroundings (i.e. leadership) if we allow ourselves to label others in a way that's anything but favorable. When I meet or observe someone like Coworker #2, though I find myself initially thinking, "Holy cow, that guy's got some ego! And he doesn't mind letting everyone know it," I should still instead force myself to correct that mental course and ask myself "Even if that is one of his weaknesses, what does it seem like this guy is good at?" or "What should I appreciate about this coworker?" or "Should I wait a little longer until I've been around him a few days before I cast any judgment at all? I might find that he's not so bad, or even that he could be a new friend in disguise." (In the case of this Coworker #2, I had immediately put up a wall of negative judgment with no provocation on his part, and had to feel very sheepish inside when he showed no hesitation later in extending his good will and acceptance - how humbling!)

Leadership opportunities are everywhere, in every imaginable setting. Until we learn to see others in a positive light, and hold back on judging books by less attractive covers, we'll delay our ability to positively influence them because we haven't cultivated a sense of good will and friendliness. In fact, finding automatic reason not to like or respect someone will only close us off to wanting to influence them in any decent way, thus tricking ourselves out of a chance to make a difference in that person's life. But when we do take up the lens of accepting, approving, and appreciating and we lovingly give others that chance to show themselves for who they really are - which often just needs a little bit of time - we can certainly find something (or maybe a lot of things) to like and be appreciative of, so we can attach to them on a human level and swing wide the door for positive influence.

Everybody is a book. Not all of us have the best covers. I resolve that, no matter the looks of the cover, I'll take the time to open the book, get beyond the table of contents and even the first chapter before labeling someone, and no matter what label I may eventually find them worthy of, I'll always find the good in the other person so I can be a blessing to their life - not a judge.

For this, God give me strength!!