Focus on the Things You CAN Do

"Focus on the things you CAN do, not the things you can't."

It sounds like some trite phrase trotted out by folks who have nothing better to do with their time than to tell others they should be happy with their lot, doesn't it?

While it's worked for me, I know all too well that I've had things pretty easy throughout much of my life. Such a philosophy might be too simplistic for someone facing real difficulties. At least that's what I always thought until I had a chance recently to hear a woman speak by the name of Kathy Buckley.

Her family and her teachers just thought she was 'retarded' and put her in a school for the developmentally disabled until she was in the second grade when all along, her real problem was a hearing loss ("And they call me slow!" she says...). Then after just two years at a deaf school, she was yanked out of an environment where she felt safe and was dumped into the mainstream without any real support. She was in her thirties before anyone helped her understand that she wasn't stupid, she was just hearing impaired.

And that was AFTER she was run over by a jeep and told she wouldn't be able to walk... and later diagnosed with cervical cancer and told she might not live. Not only is she still alive and walking (and dancing too), she's smart as a whip and fall-on-your-butt funny as a comedienne. Sure, you have to get used to how she talks but it's such a small thing to do when the message she has to share is so powerful.

Really, if Kathy can do all that she's done, shouldn't the rest of us be able to overcome just about any obstacle standing in our way if we only focus on what is possible instead of what seems impossible? What would you do if you had someone around who believed in you enough to make you feel it could be done? What if that person was yourself?

"Impossible" is usually just a thing we say to ourselves when we're really just afraid to live up to our true potential. It might be easy for me to say... and now I know from having heard Kathy's story (from Kathy herself) that it's actually true.

When Stupid Stuff Happens

You know, sometimes stupid stuff just happens.

For no seeming rhyme or reason, someone good gets laid off. Or a really great kid is faced with living with a serious heart defect the rest of his life, always wondering if he's going to need another open heart surgery and all the risk and trauma that entails. Or a skilled, top-notch pilot bends a wingtip - for a second time, possibly ending his flying career. Is it bad luck, poor judgment or action on someone's part, karma, or some divine plan for some greater good we can't see... or is it time to get paranoid that somebody's out to get us?

I've held every single one of these opinions at one time or another. Sometimes several at once or at least in rapid succession. Sometimes life just sucks and that's all there is to it. I used to defend my beliefs in this area and in so doing, came to the realization that the justification that makes the most sense to me is that I hold onto whatever belief helps me out the most at the time. Usually my preference is to use my beliefs to help me move forward (see, no whining for me either) so I tend to think in terms of things happening for a reason and I set out in search of it. Hey, it's good for pulling me out of a funk anyway.

Lately, I've started to moderate my thinking further though I'll be honest in sharing that while I can see the destination I'm charting toward I'm definitely not there yet. My new way of thinking goes something like this - The situation is what it is. Whatever complicity I have in getting myself here, I may be able to learn from it but it can't be undone so forgiving myself and finding a way to appreciate where I am is the only remaining action available to me now. Furthermore, given that life sucks (at least on occasion), unless I want to throw in the "no whining" towel (I don't) or continually beat my head against the wall, it's probably a good idea to figure out ways to enjoy life or at least appreciate it even when things don't go the way I want them to.

Maybe you have some strategies that work for you that you'd like to share - if so, please send them to techsurvivor@soaringmountain.com.

Accurate or not, treating situations as the result of some cosmic force for greater good is more likely to get you farther and in a healthier state of mind than any of the other options. Try looking for the benefits anyway and see how that changes your perspective.

Got Brains?

How's this for smarts: I have periodically googled my employers and my own name from time to time just to see what comes up. One time that I did this a while back, I ran across a guy's blog wherein he proceeded to blast the company that I worked for and the whole interview process he had recently gone through with some of their folks.

I know what you're thinking - he's entitled to his opinion. Sure, that's what I thought too... until I read that he had another interview scheduled with that same company a short time after the date of that particular blog entry.

It was one of those cartoon shake-the-head double-take moments. What was he thinking?! These are people who are potentially in the position to offer you a job - and you publicly insult their interview skills? It's totally irrelevant whether the guy was on-target with his opinions or not. Who would want to hire him after reading about themselves like that? And if he really didn't want the job after all (as the blog seemed to imply), then why bother accepting another interview?

On a different tangent, for years, I've been telling employees they should think more carefully about what they send via company email. Like many, I sometimes have gotten lax about this myself but in general, I try to think about what I'd be willing to have people read if a message were to get printed and left out at work. In the old days, the most anyone had to worry about was whether the company was machiavellian enough to want to wade through a lot of email to find anything incriminating. Not only are there filters now that make that job easier (and so more likely - especially if we give them any reason to want to go looking for incriminating information) but there's more than just the possibility of a malicious employer (probably more remote than most people are willing to believe) involved now too.

Consider the case of the Enron employees whose personal email messages were made a matter of public record because of the lawsuit. In the future, expect to see guidelines established around how to treat email as a strategic asset that should be included in comprehensive data retention policies. That means that sometime soon, we're likely to be asked to save just about everything we send. Beats me how IT will deal with that, given that they're usually the ones who set limits on the size of my inbox but it's probably coming down the pike anyway.

These things have been percolating in my brain for a while now. The real news today was a story I read in today's Seattle Post-Intelligencer that really made me stop and think about a few things. It's is about Michael Hanscom, who was fired because of his blog and it really personalizes some of the other stuff I just mentioned.

If you're not too quick to jump on the whiner band-wagon, there's a lot to learn here. First off - in reading his blog entries, Michael is clearly not a whiner. That's good. You know I can't tolerate whiners; what you may not realize is that the reason I have such trouble with whining is that nothing good comes from it.

Case in point: this guy could run off blaming the company that fired him and not get anything from it except a bunch of whiner-bandwagon "friends" who are willing to commiserate just so long as he feels like venting about how he's been wronged. Those folks are just looking for the next pity party.

Instead, Michael seems to be genuinely interested in sorting through what his mistakes might have been so he can avoid them in the future. And while he's willing to point out ways he thinks the situation could have been handled better, he doesn't fall for the blame game trap - hopefully because he recognizes that really wouldn't get him anywhere. What will (I predict) get him someplace worthwile is that he seems to have strong ethical standards and is up-front about who he is, fully backing whatever he writes these days. Proof: it's beginning to look like this combination is going to result in some pretty decent press for him - meaning, that he could very well come out of this not just 'okay' but maybe 'pretty darned good'.

Another important lesson here is that mistakes are rarely a matter of life & death. Certainly they are in some situations but that's not the norm. Somebody smart enough to realize this will be willing to hire him. And when they do, they'll probably be the sort of folks he likes working with because they'll have open conversations with him about their expectations and will give him room to make some minor mistakes while giving him plenty of warning if he's getting too close to a big one. That's just my guess anyway.

Of course, the guys that fired him over the blog would probably benefit from a better approach themselves but without more information it's impossible to tell that for sure so I'll leave my opinions about that side of it for another time when I can use a situation I'm more familiar with.

With regard to the blogging, I can only suggest that you should feel comfortable printing out your most recent entries and posting them on your refrigerator at home and on your cube wall at work for friends, family and co-workers to see. If it can't pass that test, then maybe you should re-think the writing and/or the people you associate yourself with.

If you think I'm wrong, I'd be interested to hear your ideas about a situation where you have legitimate concerns over what you're willing to write and who could see it. Send them to techsurvivor@soaringmountain.com.

If you always conduct yourself as you true best self, and stick with people who can appreciate you for that, then you probably haven't got anything to worry about.

What's Your Trap?

Are you the sort who looks before you leap or do you get stuck, still wanting to know more before you're willing to take a step?

Either trait is pretty common, especially with tech folks. If you're not sure which you are, take a look around you at the people who drive you most nuts... "She never thinks these things through - she just blows right through with her big ideas, expecting everyone else to pick up the pieces when they don't go right!"... "He couldn't make a move to save his life!"

If the thought under your breath is, "Good thing I'm not like that!" then you probably struggle with the opposite issue. If you simply cringe when you see what others do wrong, then it's probably a sympathy cringe, seeing your own behavior in someone else.

Great, so you know what your problem is - okay, bigshot, NOW what?

The way I figure it, every weakness is just a strength taken too far. Back off a bit and you'll be in just the right place.

If you're impulsive, that passion can do a lot for you. All that's needed is to harness it and add in some critical thinking before launching. Invite someone whose judgment you trust to take a look at your idea and offer other viewpoints. If there's criticism, don't let it get you down; instead, re-work your proposal to address the issues raised.

If you suffer from analysis paralysis, figure out even one small step that will take you in the direction you want to go. You can always adjust later; that one step just gets you moving and helps break the logjam of activity. After that one step, think of one more and then another until you've got some momentum built up. Continue to analyze as you go along but forget about perfection. It's not gonna happen!

Even the yellow brick road wandered around and around a bit before taking off toward the Emerald City. That's okay. When the pathway does straighten out, that's when you want to check to be sure it's headed the direction you want, making whatever adjustments you think are necessary then.

Where do you get hung up - on the thinking part or the doing part? Send me an email at techsurvivor@soaringmountain.com and give me your best "yeah, but".

What is one thing you could do to improve the linkage between thinking and acting?

Taking Time Out Before Being Taken Out

I wrote that last entry when I was trying to recover from the flu. It about knocked me flat but I probably had it coming. One thing I've learned is that I usually only get sick when I'm not giving myself enough time to rest up. I always have a good reason for running 90-per so my body steps in once in awhile just to say, "Enough already!"

There's even research out now that validates my long-standing theory that I only get sick after I've completed some major sprinting effort... after I finished taking my finals, after some big project has been turned over to the next group, after some important rollout, etc.

Once I figured out that the world was not going to come to an end just because I recognized I needed a rest before my body gave out, things started running a lot more smoothly all the way around. I was going to have to take the time away from work one way or another at some point. Why not make it more a thing of my concious choosing & control rather than waiting just to get sick at the most inconvenient time possible?

This is not to say I like taking time off gratuitously because "I have it coming to me." We all know people who think only of themselves and not at all about the team. I find those folks to be a major pain. Probably because they also tend to be the ones who whine the most. It also costs money for the business - money that, when it's spent on absenteeism, isn't available for other things like equipment, salaries, R&D, etc.

The stoics have a different problem. They tend to think only of the team and hardly ever about themselves, not realizing they're not helping the team any if they totally burn themselves or their bodies out and so therefore aren't even available to the team at all.

It's a whole knowing when to stop as well as knowing when to act that is key to the I Ching "Keeping Still Mountain", one genesis point for the name Soaring Mountain Enterprises, so yeah, you could say it's a general philosophy of mine.

How are you finding the right balance for you... What are you struggling with? Send me an email at techsurvivor@soaringmountain.com and let's talk about how to make it work better.

The greatest benefits are had when there's an overlap between the interests of the individual and of the group.

Death Is Nature's Way of Telling You To Slow Down

"Death is nature's way of telling you to slow down"

We all have things we'd like to do "if only I had enough time." Exercise, spend more time with the family, relax, do something fun (what - spending time with the family isn't fun and relaxing?!), whatever. The thing is, if you don't have enough time to do these things now, just when is it you think you will have time? Have you found it yet?

Probably not. It's called the "Myth of Spontaneity" and it's got us duped into thinking we'll get to these things after this "one urgent thing I've got to do first."

If the urgent thing really is that much more important, sure go for it. How many times, though, do we really stop to question what's truly important in our lives? And how often do we fool ourselves into thinking that an action is a "must-do" or a thing is a "must-have" when in reality, that might not be the case?

Want to know a good test?

Try thinking of it in terms of your 95th birthday. Will you rate this as one of the things you're most pleased about in your life if you do it or have it? Will you still regret it that much later if you don't?

If you're feeling pressured into putting in long hours at work that take away from feeling like you have a balanced life, you're not alone. Tomorrow is Take Back Your Time Day. It's scheduled to coincide with the day out of the year that the typical American could stop working altogether - and still have worked the same number of hours as the average Western European.

Maybe you just need help sorting out the logistics of achieving the sort of balance you want. I'm planning to give Life Balance™ software a try - it sure looks interesting anyway.

On the "gottas" (I gotta do this or else...), I can only say I dare you to think about it differently or find another way.

I'm sure I don't want to hear all the reasons you can't make more time for yourself (remember - no whining!). How about instead you think of one way you can (just one, we don't want your brain to burst). Try it and send me a message at techsurvivor@soaringmountain.com - I'd like to hear how it works out.

What would you do if you had the time?