The Power of "And"

I always admired how a former colleague, in response to suggestions or requests, would reply, “Yes, and…” rather than “Yes, but…” “Yes,” she’d say, “adding a new session is a great idea, and we’ll have to utilize some additional resources,” versus, “Yes, adding a new session is a great idea, but we don’t have the resources.” “Yes, but” focuses on obstacles (e.g. "Yes, but we tried that before"). “Yes, and” drives us to uncover possibilities, improves upon the original idea, and makes for collaborative conversation. Those, like my colleague, who say “Yes, and” earn a reputation of being people who listen and add value.

Then there’s the concept of the “genius of the ‘and’; the tyranny of the ‘or’” from business best-seller, Built to Last. The “tyranny of the ‘or’” we’re told, is an unnecessary limitation on the heights to which we can rise: Not lower cost or higher quality, but both; not higher performance or lower price, but both. “Or” focuses on trade-offs; “and” is the aspiration and insistence that one can have both.

What a powerful word - “And!” What happens when you use it instead of ‘or’ and ‘but?’

Have a lovely day and be well!
~ Sophie

Decision-Free

Working at Weight Watchers, I’ve learned that people face about 200 food-related decisions every day (and remember only about 15 of them). This got me thinking – What if I made all my food-related decisions in advance? Wouldn’t that eliminate the need for willpower in the face of a box of donuts in the break room, or the chance of making a wrong choice when making a decision in a rush? For the last two days, I’ve tested this – planning each evening what I would eat the next day and when. I’m enjoying just checking off what’s on my list and ignoring all other choices and temptations. I wonder if there are other decisions that can be made in advance that would make making positive choices easier. Think so?

 All the best,

~ Sophie 

“Once you make a decision, the universe conspires to make it happen.” ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

“Using the power of decision gives you the capacity to get past any excuse to change any and every part of your life in an instant.” ~ Tony Robbins 

 “All my life, whenever it comes time to make a decision, I make it and forget about it.” ~ Harry S Truman

Take it Easy

Staples’ “That was easy” campaign is brilliant. Making things easy for customers is being kind to them, and kind to yourself. We all need an easy button.

Things that make my life easier: Buying pre-sliced vegetables from my on-line, home-delivery grocer; having a pre-printed Costco list so I can check off what I need on my next trip; buying the first desk I find that fits my requirements, hiring a tour guide for vacation and using her itinerary (Note: Simpler can cost more, but what is your time worth?).

Now I’m going to make it easier for you to read these posts, and easier for me to write them, by trying out a shorter format – Each post will contain a thought and some quotes – in 200 words or fewer -  that you can turn into a coaching exercise, if you’re so inclined, or just contemplate.

What aspects of your life can you make easier? Share!

 All the best,

~ Sophie 

• “I will always chose a lazy person to do a difficult job, because, he will find an easy way to do it.” ~ Bill Gates 
• "Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication." ~ Leonardo DaVinci

Happy New Year!

Here’s another post inspired by having read The Happiness Project on my vacation last week. In looking back on her year of trying various experiments to become happier, its author, Gretchen Rubin, concludes that “the single most effective step for me had been to keep a Resolutions Chart (available at www.happinessprojecttoolbox.com).”

As resolutions are big at this time of year, I thought I’d focus on some best practices for creating and keeping resolutions and share mine with you.

Wishing each one of you a fulfilling, successful, and happy 2013!

~ Sophie

COACHING EXERCISE:  RESOLUTIONS

Step 1 - Determine what you want to do – Be as specific as possible, e.g. “kiss my spouse good bye every morning” is more actionable than “be nicer to my spouse.” It’s also a smaller step and therefore easier to accomplish and to build upon.

Step 2 - Articulate why you want to do it (for some people, this is step 1) – Do you want to kiss your spouse good bye each morning to better your relationship, to create harmony in your home, to demonstrate the level of physical affection you desire, to role model a loving relationship for your kids, or some combination of the above? Write down these motivators. They will make it possible for you to stick to your resolution when the going gets tough – when you’re rushed or angry and don’t feel like kissing your spouse some morning.

Step 3 – Set a timeframe.  Rather than making an open-ended resolution like, “I’ll kiss my spouse each morning” or “I’ll drink eight glasses of water a day” or “I’ll use the stairs,” which imply that you hope to do these things for the rest of your life, make your resolution a short-term experiment. Something like, “I’ll drink eight glasses of water a day for the next two weeks and note how I feel while doing it. If I’m noticing positive results, maybe I’ll continue for another month…” It’s much easier to commit to something for two weeks than to commit to making a life change. Plus, this reminds you to notice how your resolution is going and what results you’re experiencing and gives you permission to drop it if you aren’t getting results that appeal to you.

Here are two real-life examples of my own...

In the service of being present and of not letting the good moments in my life be overwhelmed by the more mundane ones, I will record a one-sentence journal each night in January highlighting the fleeting moments that made life sweet on that day (another Happiness Project idea).

In the service of acting in the way I want to be with others (positive and happy, rather than grumpy and critical), I will endeavor, in the month of January to give only positive reviews. That is, when asked what I thought of something, I will only share what I liked about it, even if I have to dig to find that thing. This truly is an experiment because I hold a strong belief that honest, constructive feedback is a gift, but I’d like to know what would happen if my honest feedback were all positive. There are some warm and generous people I admire who seem to be able to do this. Will I be more like them if I stick to the positive?

Along those lines, here’s my review of The Happiness Project: This book is sprinkled with thought-provoking moments and great quotes. Who can argue with its overall premise that we can set intentions that will improve our attitudes, and our lives, and then hold ourselves accountable to them? There are certainly some solid, universal ideas in here that might inspire readers to dig deeper. And Gretchen Rubin seems like a practical, vulnerable, like-minded person whom I’d enjoy having coffee with.  

QUOTES I LIKE FROM “THE HAPPINESS PROJECT”

• “The chief happiness for a man is to be what he is.” ~ Erasmus
• “Where there is no wood, the fire goes out; and where there is no talebearer, strife ceases.” ~ Proverbs 26:20
• “There are times in the lives of most of us when we would have given all the world to be as we were but yesterday, though that yesterday had passed over us unappreciated and unenjoyed.” ~ William Edward Hartpole Lecky
• “Nothing can make our life, or the lives of other people, more beautiful than kindness.” ~ Tolstoy

Secrets of Adulthood

Once or twice a year, I like to read a pop culture book that might inform my coaching. This time it’s Gretchen Rubin’s The Happiness Project.

I’m barely into it, but I found an exercise she mentions in her introductory chapter to be intriguing. She called it her “Secrets of Adulthood,” or, a list of the lessons she’d learned with some difficulty as she’d grown up. Some items on the list were profound; others simple and quirky. But, her list inspired me to share my own (or a portion of my own, as mine stretched to about two-and-a-half pages). It was fun to create, so I suggest it as the coaching exercise for this post. And I’d love to see your lists!  Here’s mine (though the first two items did come from the book)…

• People don’t notice your mistakes as much as you think
• Most decisions don’t require extensive research
• If it’s always put away in the same place, you’ll always find it there
• The only person you can change is yourself
• Saying “no” is liberating
• Perception is reality
• The tough conversations are the ones with the greatest potential for growth and to deepen relationships
• When there’s a lack of communication or transparency, people will start communicating the worst scenario
• There’s always another side to the story
• It does make the whole bedroom appear cleaner if you just make the bed
• Just because it already exists doesn’t mean you can’t do it better
• Rather than setting out to change your life, try a tiny experiment for a discrete period of time
• If you’re wide awake in the middle of the night, embrace it, don’t fight it
• The journey may be more enjoyable than the destination
• Horizontal is a pile; vertical is a file
• When you "act as if," your behavior just may change the way you think and feel
• People sense desperation
• You can't control your situation, only your reaction to it
• Feedback is a gift
• You’re more likely to act on a goal you state publically

Don’t know what to say about the fact that so many of my secrets have to do with housecleaning and organization. I guess it just reveals how anal I am! What does your list say about you?

Happy New Year!

~ Sophie

TWO QUOTES I LIKE FROM THE HAPPINESS PROJECT, “GETTING STARTED”

• “What a wonderful life I’ve had! I only wish I’d realized it sooner!” ~ Colette, author
• “We must exercise ourselves in the things which bring us happiness, since, if that be present, we have everything, and, if that be absent, all our actions are directed toward attaining it.” ~ Epicurus, philosopher

Taking Conversation to the Next Level

An article in this month’s Training & Development Magazine suggests that there are five levels of conversation and urges readers to consider where they spend most of their time on the conversation continuum.*

The levels of dialogue presented in the article are:

• Monologue – When one person claims the airspace for storytelling, lecturing, or expounding, drowning out other voices.
• Transaction – A back-and-forth conversation that remains on the surface, generally related to a transaction, e.g. "How are you doing on that project?" A"re you free to pick-up Owen after school tomorrow?" "Have you written that report yet?" Sounds to me like a lot of close-ended questions occur at this level of conversation.
• Interaction – A useful information exchange that still simply skims the surface. When you leave an interaction feeling like the other person still might not know what you meant or might not be feeling good about it, it’s often because it was this level of conversation. An example given in the article is when an employee is meeting with her manager for feedback on her performance. The meeting starts late and is rushed. After the manager talks about the employee’s results and asks her how she feels about them, she says she really doesn’t know but she does understand why she had the results she did. The meeting ends with the manager saying, “So, you’re okay with the feedback. Great.”
• Collaborative engagement – Where deeper insight and reflection take place because there is more trust and people are more willing to be vulnerable, e.g. “I yelled too much at my kids when they were little, too.” “Really? But you always seem so calm and together. What did you do to stop yelling so much?” “Well, I learned to warn the kids in advance when I needed their cooperation and I learned to take a time-out myself when I needed it.”
• Dialogue – When shared understanding emerges and mutual learning takes place.

 As your coaching exercise for this post (and mine, too), I suggest one or more of the following:

• Pay attention to your conversations this week. What level of conversations are you having? Maybe that’s all you do this week. Just noticing the trends in your conversation is an important exercise all on its own.
• Challenge yourself to have at least one conversation at a higher level this week.
• Notice what needed to happen for that higher-level conversation to take place. Did you have to devote more time to the conversation? Did you have to make more eye contact? Did you have to turn off your phone? Did you ask more questions?
• Notice how that higher-level conversation made you feel and the impact it had on your relationship with the other person / people involved.
• Decide what you want to do about your conversations  as a result of this challenge and what you notice while doing it.

All the best,

~ Sophie

* “A Little More Conversation” by Lois J. Zachary, T&D, October 2012.

QUOTES

• “The most fruitful and natural exercise for our minds is, in my opinion, conversation.”  ~ Michel de Montaigne, The Essays: A Selection
• “Good communication is as stimulating as black coffee and just as hard to sleep after.” ~ Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Gift from the Sea
• “It was impossible to get a conversation going; everybody was talking too much.” ~ Yogi Berra
• “Ideal conversation must be an exchange of thought, and not, as many of those who worry most about their shortcomings believe, an eloquent exhibition of wit or oratory” ~ Emily Post

Reminders from Hurricane Sandy

A few days ago, Hurricane Sandy tore through the Northeast. From the safety of my 6^th floor apartment on the Upper West Side of Manhattan - an area that was spared the flooding, power outages and damage others experienced - I am able to reflect on the lessons that the hurricane can teach us. I know it is a luxury to be able to sit in my safe and warm home and reflect on these lessons. To those who are dealing with the aftermath of the storm and who don’t have the luxury to ruminate, I send my very best wishes for a speedy and full recovery.

Here are the reminders I took from Sandy:

·         Show Gratitude – Those who’ve read this blog over time know that over and over again, I am thankful for my good fortune, in good times and in bad. In the wake of Hurricane Sandy, I am thankful for my intact and lovely home, and for the safety of my family who is hunkered down with me in it. I am reminded to experience and show my gratitude.

·         Be connected – Before the storm landed, millions of people across the Northeast were warned of what could be coming their way. Millions were in the path of the hurricane. What happened to some could have happened to any of us. I am reminded that we are all connected by how life starts and ends and what life puts in our way. Additionally, I appreciated the number of inquiries from friends, colleagues, and even distant acquaintances, asking how we were faring. I am reminded that I am not alone; that there are people out there who care. I am reminded to be one of them.

·         Remember your priorities – Each notification I’ve received letting me know that my office, or my childrens’ schools, are still closed ends with a statement to the effect of “your safety is of utmost importance.” I am reminded by the hurricane of what matters most. I am reminded to pay attention to the safety and health of myself and my loved ones, even when a tropical storm isn’t brewing around us.

·         Slow down – In coaching, I’m often reminding clients to slow down and to be present; to experience what is happening, rather than rushing through it. Going in to our 6^th day in the house with not as much to do and not as many places to go, I am savoring the rare opportunity to slow down, and I’m reminded of the importance of stepping out of the usual routines now and again to reflect on the sorts of things this post is highlighting.

·         Recover – Coaching is, in part, about noticing what’s gone wrong and then recovering. While communities around me clean up from the devastation of Hurricane Sandy, I am reminded of what I need to right and repair in my life and am more motivated to do it.

I hope these reminders come to you free of any damage from the recent disaster.

All the best,

~ Sophie

QUOTES

“Everything that slows us down and forces patience, everything that sets us back into the slow circles of nature, is a help.” ~ May Sarton, author

“You are one of the forces of nature.” ~ Jules Michelet, French historian