Charles Atlas Day 28

Chapter 4 is underway and my stomach hurts.  The Charles Atlas nine-exercise ab workout is surely just as tough as any Hip Hop Abs or P90X infommercial would boast.  I also just experienced the first exercise that I cannot do – the equivalent of a gymnast doing an “L Sit” on an armchair.  Not only am I worried about busting the arms off my dining table chair, I’m worried about spraining something in my own arms. 

Charles Atlas calls this exercise vigorous, and to work into it slowly, so I am not giving up.  I am doing these L Sit dips with one foot on the floor until I have the strength to support my whole body.  I could do this when I was 25. I know I can do it again.

My chest and upper arms are really showing results from consistent morning and evening exercise so far, so I’m trusting that my abs will follow.  You guys all know how tough it is to get rid of that last little layer of fat on the stomach so your abs can show through.  I’m going for it.

One more quick word on the mental toughness required for fitness.  The most amazing thing I did last week was resist eating a piece of apple pie a la mode that was put in front of me at a business dinner.  I said no, but my good friend wanted to share and “distribute the wealth” anyway.  I stared at it, looked up and then glowered at it again as it called to me in its sweet little high-pitched voice,  “Oh, one little bite won’t hurt. Come on the ice cream is melting.”  I defeated the pie by covering it up with a napkin and silencing its little voice forever. 

My Favorite Charles Atlas Quote of the Week:

“It is all very well to have strong arms and a grip of steel, but of what use are these unless the abdominal area is in perfect condition?” – Charles Atlas

Top 10 ways to make running more fun

One of my friends told me he doesn’t like to run because it is boring.  If you are in the same camp and find it difficult to maintain this healthy habit in your life, I humbly submit this top ten ways to make running more fun and entertaining. 

Give each one a try and please report your experience in the Comments below.

10.  Put a TV in front of your treadmill and watch adrenaline-inducing shows like Big Ten basketball, 24 and the Flavor of Love.

9.  Sign up for a 10K, Half-Marathon or Angry Mob Fun Run and give yourself an exciting event to prepare for.

8.  Set your ipod on Shuffle and run to the beat of whatever song comes up.  Be sure to add the Ramones, Green Day and Blink-182 to the mix.

7.  Make your goals semi-public in Facebook and invite your friends to trash-talk and motivate you.

6.  Imagine you are an ancient runner on the plains of Marathon, and if you don’t warn your people in time, the invading army will destroy your city and way of life as you know it.  Go nude or toga, whatever is more comfortable for you.

5.  Imagine you are a ninja running across the hills of China, and if you don’t warn your people in time, the invading Huns will destroy the Forbidden City and your way of life as you know it. Ninjas only wear black.

4.  You know that pile of business and self-development books you’ve been meaning to get to?  Buy them on iTunes and listen while you run.

3.  Read the book Chi-Running and save your knees like I did.

2.  Buy some Body Glide anti-friction balm and use it wherever you need it. Not really fun, but it prevents pain that will ruin your fun.  Just keepin’ it real.

And the #1 way to make running more fun is…

1.  Run barefoot on a beach in a red speedo.  Really, try it.

iThink iPad is a great name

Were there NO women on the naming committee? How could a smart company like Apple miss the obvious connotations for a name like iPad?  Answer… they knew exactly what they were doing.  And not only did they capture the usual technology press for their product launch, they captured the comedy press as well.  Yes, I think we now have a new record for jokes about the formerly taboo topic of feminine hygiene.

After the jokes die down and the product works its way into the hands of cultish Apple fans, you will appreciate the brilliance of the name.  It passes the crucial naming test… is it simple, easy to pronounce, spell and remember?  Yes.  Does it follow a product family naming convention that is synonymous with cool, successful products?  Yes.  It is just one letter away from being “iPod,” one of the most revolutionary consumer products of the last decade?

This is the most compelling reason why it was not called iTablet or iTab.  This thing is a lot more like an iPod than a Tablet computer.  I heard two engineers complaining about the lack of a removable battery and USB port.  Exactly. Apple is NOT releasing another pen-based Tablet computer, a category that has still not caught on with the mainstream.

Instead, it looks to me like they are releasing a larger iPod, which solves the problem of trying to watch movies or read e-books on a tiny little hand-held screen.  The eyesight-challenged over-40 crowd thanks you for this.  Add wireless Internet and you don’t need to plug-in to get your media.  Apple just changed the game with a device that incorporates multiple revenue streams for them, and endless opportunities for the app-generating generation.

Laugh all you want.  Steve Jobs is once again laughing his way to the bank.  Stay tuned for the next launch… Apple’s new cosmetically-challenged personal aircraft, the iSoar.

The eyes have it

“Look me in the eye and tell me you did not hit your brother!” Any parent knows that the eyes are the ultimate lie detector.  They are the mirror to the soul, the barometer of emotion and the great revealer of attention deficit. Likewise, if you want to show someone your passion, confidence or sincerity, you want to do it face to face if possible… because your eyes give you an edge in delivering your message.

Why then do so many of us squander face-to-face opportunities by looking away, watching TV or checking a text message when we’re talking with someone in person? I’m guilty. I have caught myself doing of all of these from time to time. 

The message this behavior sends is “you are not as important as whatever it is I am looking at.” Even if you are completely tuned in with your ears, your eyes show that you don’t care.  Is this the way you want to be perceived by your boss, your spouse or your friends?

I understand that technology has now put our social network at our fingertips 24/7, and there are so many amazing connections, experiences and knowledge this has brought to our lives.  But should we let it interfere with the sacred opportunity of connecting with another human being?

Have you watched teenagers and the way they communicate today?  They can snap instantly from being fully present with your conversation to another world in the palm of their hand.  It’s an instant message that must be answered instantly.  My natural reaction is to stop talking when I lose the eye contact. 

After 5 seconds of awkward silence, I hear the multi-tasking teen say “Go on I’m listening.”

I reply, “No, that’s OK. I’ll wait.”

When the text message is complete, they return to the regularly scheduled program with you.  And the funny thing is… there’s typically no feeling of rudeness on their part.  This is the way they communicate all day long with their friends.  Sadly, this may be an un-reversible trend.

Let’s try a social experiment together.  The next time an iphone or crackberry addict checks out of a conversation with you, just stop talking in mid-sentence and turn and walk away. They will look up after 20 seconds and wonder if you were abducted by aliens.  Of course YOU will probably be perceived as the rude one, but you’ll make a point.

Let’s make a better effort to be fully present with each other.  Unless you’re a doctor being called to emergency surgery, the text can wait.  If the eyes truly are the mirror to the soul, what kind of soul do you want to show to the world?

Smells like team spirit

I know what you’re thinking; the business world does not have enough acronyms. So allow me to propose one more for the lexicon.  When you hear the word TEAM, it could easily stand for Tyranny, Entropy, Anarchy & Mass confusion.  Lots of teams start out with best intentions, but end up devolving and dissolving into these non-productive states.

Let’s craft a new acronym for TEAM.  How about Trust, Empathy, Attitude & Mission?  Aspiring to the following principles helps make me a better team member, and may help you too.

Trust.  This is built over time and must be earned, not demanded.  Doing what you say you will do builds trust.  Flaking out will destroy it.  I’m still learning this lesson over and over again… under-promise and over-deliver.

Empathy.  Tune in to your team members emotions, not just the job at hand.  If someone seems anxious, aggravated or withdrawn, it pays to take a few moments to find out why.  Maybe a private conversation will reveal a simple solution and keep them motivated toward helping the team.

Attitude.  Keeping a positive attitude through obstacles and stress is easier said than done.  But choosing to unravel under pressure will absolutely make things worse.  Keep your cool and keep working toward solutions.

Mission.  A clear mission is the key to staying on track.  If you’re leading your team, this provides the lighthouse for the team to steer toward as storms of change swirl around them.  Trying to accomplish too many missions at once is a recipe for a shipwreck.

You may be on a permanent team like a department within a large company; or a temporary team (task force, tiger team or special committees) which is not meant to last forever. Whatever the size or duration of the team, these are a few principles I’ve found that will hold a team together and produce outstanding results.

Hmmm… what acronym could we create for the word WORK?

Charles Atlas Day 13

I wasn’t kidding… I am sticking with it!  Two weeks down and ready to move on to Chapter 3.  Each section gives new exercises to add to the daily routine, but not before being treated to nutritional and motivational advice. Overall the advice has been pretty solid – no white flour, watch the bad carbs, etc.  

However, cutting out coffee and tea (“poison to the body”) is a hard one. I’ve still got $30 in Starbucks gift cards from Christmas!  Good thing they carry fruit juice and sandwiches.  I’ve also taken to warming up orange juice in the morning as a coffee substitute.

Another bit of charming advice from the 20’s.  “You are especially urged to beware of the common practice of getting a light lunch of a soda and a slice of cake. What nourishment is this? Very little. Yet millions of men and women are doing this every noon.”  Maybe the Great Depression was really caused by everyone coming down from their sugar buzz all at the same time?

I’ve been doing the upper body exercises religiously every morning and every night.  And you know what?  It works.  I’ve put almost 2 inches on my chest in just 2 weeks.  Yes it hurts, but it’s growing.  Could it be that consistency is more important than which exact exercises you do?

I am struggling a bit with an old sprained wrist injury that forces me to do the dip pushups on my fists instead of my hands. I found the old velcro wrist brace that gives it a little more support.  No pain, no gain.

Just peeked at Chapter Three and it looks like the Hip Hop Abs are coming. Or maybe it was the Charleston Abs back then.  But first I get to learn about “digestive and intestinal maintenance”…  oooh I can’t wait!

My favorite Charles Atlas Quote of the week:

“Remember, you cannot increase the size of your muscles and round out the body to perfection living on a split pea and a glass of water. You’ve GOT to eat.”

Not that far away

Island nation full of souls

Earth breaks and the ground rolls

Rolls again and the house falls

I cannot breathe, can’t see the walls

Where’s my brother he was just here

When will the dust cloud start to clear?

It’s dark, it’s cold and I cannot see

Is someone coming to rescue me?

The voice is muffled but musters hope

It’s coming closer, there’s a rope

Pulling, the slab slides to the right

My eyes are blinded by the light

My lungs expand, my legs are free

I see the people who rescued me

Digging with haste could they possibly

Find the rest of my family?

www.hopeforhaitinow.org

My friends, the earthquake in Haiti is a tragedy of biblical proportions.  If you have the means, give now to the relief effort.  Then schedule another gift in 30 days.  We are once again showing the world how we respond to humans in need. Share this poem with your friends if you think it will help make a difference.

A new bar with Avatar

Spoiler Alert:  This blog will reveal plot elements of the movie.  Then again, if you’ve seen Dances with Wolves, Pocahontas or Fern Gully, you’ve already seen some of the plot elements anyway.  So what?  If we banished movies based on borrowed plot elements, the theaters would be empty.

Seeing James Cameron win a Golden Globe for Avatar last night recalled memories of Titanic, True Lies and Terminator 2, some of my favorite blockbusters of all time.  Even though it’s been reported that Cameron is an obsessive, relentlessly detail-oriented director (and not the kind of boss most people like to work for) it’s hard to argue with the quality of his work.

What prompts me to write today is just that – the people who are complaining about Avatar.  Are you kidding me? I admit I’m a science fiction and comic book fan from way back, and it doesn’t take much for me to suspend my disbelief, but how can you not be impressed and enthralled by this movie? I know it’s fun to pick on #1, but come on.

Think back to the “mind-blowing” special effects of the first Star Wars movie just 3 decades ago, and compare to the immersive environment of Avatar today.  The planet Pandora is alive and as much of a character in the film as the actors.  And you know what… it’s hard to even call it a “film.”  It’s a masterpiece created with digital 3D tools, mixing human, alien, animal and plant life into a visual feast that’s difficult to forget.

Maybe your expectations were too high.  When I heard “new James Cameron movie” I went out to see it as soon as possible, so I could avoid the commentary like the one you are reading right now.  I went in with an open mind and came out with a “wow.”

I was bothered by a few things in the movie, especially the archetype of the overzealous career solider.  Even though it was a “private security force” on the planet, this was a thinly veiled slam at the US military.  Other than the one female pilot who went rogue, this army is portrayed as a one-dimensional soulless killing machine.  With our brave men and women (including several of my son’s friends from high school) fighting wars overseas right now, this smacks of a heavy-handed political statement.  Cameron has a right to express his political point of view, but it hit me the same wrong way as when I saw an airplane crash in Jurassic Park 3 not longer after terrorists crashed planes into the Twin Towers on September 11^th, 2001.  It’s a timing thing.

As for the greedy corporate executive, this part always seems to be cast as a 40-something caucasian male who cares about nothing but the bottom line.  I am a 40-something caucasian male working for one of the most successful corporations in the world today.  Our company spends a lot of effort and money helping solve problems in the world and I just don’t see the greedy villains so often portayed in movies today.  But that’s just my experience. 

I also get a little miffed at TV commercials that always portray family fathers as bumbling buffoons, mainly because I am a bumbling buffoon and it just hits too close to home.

Don’t hate Avatar because it’s beautiful.  And don’t be bothered by the “unoriginal” storyline. There are plenty of other unique elements I won’t list here because I want you to experience the same surprise and delight that I did when you see it. Bottom line for me… Avatar is both beautiful and bothersome, but what’s wrong with being a little bothered?  It makes you think, doesn’t it?

Though I may regret it, your comments are welcome!

Spinning your wheels

Have you ever used the phrase “spinning your wheels” to describe a situation where there’s a lot of activity going on, but you’re not getting the results you want?  For you warm weather types, I don’t believe you can fully appreciate the phrase until your car has been stuck in a deep snowdrift in the middle of a blinding snowstorm at 20 below zero (so cold you can blow your nose and see icicles in your Kleenex.)

I used to drive a stretch of highway 65 between West Lafayette and Indianapolis, Indiana in the middle of winter.  One night snow was drifting over the highway with a thin sheet of ice underneath.  I was doing 55 miles per hour, when the gusting wind started to push my car into a slide.  I frantically tried to steer out of it, but somehow did a complete 360 and ended up facing forward with the right side of my car stuck in a snowdrift on the right side ditch. 

After my heart stopped pounding from the adrenaline surge, I hit the gas and heard the dreaded high pitched whining of a wheel spinning in place.  Let me explain again to you warm weather folks.  This was back in the day of rear wheel drive cars.  My ’71 Monte Carlo had racing slick tires that were really cool in the summer, really useless in the winter.  When your tire spins in a snow rut, it polishes it into a perfect little slushy ice cradle that gets deeper with every rotation.

There are a few tricks to freeing yourself, like the rocking technique.  You hit the gas enough to get your car moving up out of the rut.  Then let off the gas and let it slide backward.  As gravity pulls it forward, hit the gas to go a little farther up the front side. Repeat this procedure until your car gets enough momentum to get up over the edge and find traction.

I tried rocking for 15 minutes with no results. The rut just got deeper and deeper and I was dangerously low on gas. Several large trucks and cars with tire chains rumbled by me, but I was determined to do this myself. 

I moved on to plan B – wedge something under the tire.  I found an old Budweiser box half-buried in the snow, and I wedged it in there along with a few twigs.  Of course, other drivers would carry a bag of rock salt or kitty litter in their trunk just for occasions like this, but not me.  I was not that smart.  I hit the gas again and the tire just chewed up the cardboard and spit it out the back. 

After 30 minutes of trying to escape on my own, I got back in the driver’s seat, lowered my head onto the steering wheel and said out loud “God help me… I am stuck.”

That’s when I heard the knock on the window.  I looked up to see a pair of friendly eyes tucked behind a red wool scarf and a John Deere hat. I rolled down the window a few inches.  He said “Need a push?”

As much as I hated to admit it, I said “Yes, I could use a push.”

He said “You rock it and I’ll push from the back.” And he walked around to my rear bumper.

I hit the gas and let off 3 times in a row.  As I reached the top of the rut on the 4^th time, the Good Samaritan gave a big shove at just the right time, got me up over the top and moving forward again!  I didn’t want to risk stopping and getting stuck, so I drove off down the frozen highway, managing a quick wave out the window.  I never knew his name and never got to thank him, so I’d like to say thank you to him right now (wherever he is) for his good deed that evening. 

But this story is not about good-deed doers.  It was about my unwillingness to ask for help.  I struggled for 30 minutes when I could have simply flagged someone down and gotten the little push I needed.

Ladies, I know what you’re thinking… this is part of the male DNA.  We don’t ask for directions. We don’t read instructions. And we certainly don’t ask for help until we’ve tried to fix it ourselves. 

But I know that many of you men AND women have been there before… struggling to get traction on a project at work, struggling to improve a relationship, struggling to get started on your real dream.  And you keep trying the same things over and over, spinning your wheels, digging a deeper rut, and even running out of gas.

My challenge to you – the next time you’re stuck in a storm in your life, I want you to skip past all the wheel spinning and ask for help.  You may have to set aside your pride or give up a little control, but the minute you accept that you can’t do it all alone… help will appear and knock on your window.

It’s not that you aren’t capable or powerful or willing.  It’s just that sometimes, everyone can use a little push, at just the right time.

Charles Atlas Day 5

Five days into the Atlas program.  It’s definitely NOT easy, and I’m doing my best to follow the instructions to the letter.  I’m putting pep, punch, vigor, vim and snap into every movement.

The toughest advice Atlas gives is not an exercise.  He says you must get right up out of bed immediately when you wake up.  That ain’t easy when its cold outside and warm under the blanket.  Plus I’ve been waking up at 5am to give me time to do the exercises and still get ready and make it to my commuter train on time.  Dark and cold.  I want my mommy.

Up to now, I only exercised once a day, but Atlas tells me to do the exercises in the morning and do them just before bed too.  I’m starting to really feel it in my chest, the focus of the first chapter.  I don’t see a he-man emerging yet, but it’s only been 5 days.

Some of this text has a vintage charm to it.  Like advising that you do your deep breathing with a window open, to avoid inhaling kerosene fumes.  Kerosene?! This really was written in the 20s, wasn’t it?

Though its not specified in the Atlas program, I’m continuing my running, doing 5 miles every other day.  I’m also thinking about signing up for another half-marathon in April.  That will require some hill running and regular training.  Let’s hope I don’t get injured playing soccer on Sundays!

Charles Atlas quote of the week:

“Remember, all evil habits may be destroyed by the person who really desires to destroy them.” 

Hmm… that’s actually some pretty timeless advice.

Will Charles Atlas make a man out of me?

I wrote a short story about shortcuts in April 2009, and mentioned the Charles Atlas bodybuilding course as an example of a quick fix that did not work for me as a young boy.  Little did I know, Charles Atlas is a highly searched keyword and this post became the most-viewed on my blog with over 1000 visitors and counting.

I recently got a scathing comment from a Charles Atlas fan who used the patented “dynamic tension” system for over 25 years, claiming success for himself and labeling me as a liar, weakling, idiot and loser.  In fact, it sounded a lot like what the bully would have said after kicking sand in Mac’s face in those classic comic book ads.

I wrote back an apology, acknowledging that I had never heard from someone who so believed in the Atlas system, and he apologized in return for the harsh words.  I also went back and changed the term “evil marketing genius” to just “marketing genius,” as the Atlas fan had made a good point.  It wasn’t Charles Atlas’ fault that I had quit the program.

So what’s a blogger to do, 30 years later?  I looked up Charles Atlas and ordered the course, of course.  The company is still alive, still selling the same content it sold 80 years ago.  I got the package last night and eagerly read the first 2 chapters as instructed.

1920’s English is almost like a different language, with words like “vim” and “vigor” and “make a supreme effort to reach the ceiling.”  And there are photos of the vintage Charles Atlas, pop culture icon and guru, demonstrating each exercise.

Let’s get this out of the way up front.  I saw Rocky Horror Picture Show in college and know about the references made by Frank Furter… about dynamic tension and wanting to “take Charles Atlas by the hand.” Tim Curry was great in that role, but he looked like he just drove 50mph through the Mary Kay drive-up window. I’m doing my best to blot those disturbing images out of my mind, even though that cult movie may be partially responsible for keeping the Atlas company alive today.

I committed to following this program to the letter for 90 days and measuring the results.  Let’s see what happens.  No, let’s see what I can make happen.

A wave of fear

I was paddling like crazy and getting nowhere.  Lying face down on my 6 foot surfboard, smelling the bubblegum flavored board wax, I was trying to ride a wave into the Huntington Beach beach.  Learning to surf was one of the first things I wanted to do when I moved from Indiana to California, but it was a lot harder than it looked in those surf movies.

My wife had a friend at work who sold me an old surfboard for $50 and was willing to teach me how to ride it.  (In hindsight, I think Tim just wanted someone to join him so he had an excuse to surf more.) 

He made it look effortless.  Paddle out with your arms, wait for a good wave, turn and point your nose at the beach, paddle a few fast strokes at the right time, push yourself to stand up and then ride the wave in toward the shore.

I had trouble with every single step of this process.  Swimming out on the board was the hardest part.  I got pummeled by wave after wave as I tried to move forward.  Each time a wave hit I had to push my board straight down into it and let it wash over me.  With exhausted arms I finally sat up next to Tim and waited for a good wave.  Several small 3 foot waves gently rolled by before he whipped around and shouted “Here we go!”

I squinted through my saltwater reddened eyes to see a monster wave approaching.  It was probably only 6 feet high but it looked like a monster to me. Tim yelled out “Paddle!!”  I managed to turn my board toward the shore, but all I could muster the courage to do was look back over my shoulder and hold on for dear life.  The last thing I saw was Tim popping up on his board and gliding off to the right, as the monster crashed down onto me in a swirl of sand, seaweed and saltwater.

What do you do when you’re gripped by fear?  Let’s take public speaking for example, one of the most feared challenges people have to face at work, weddings and get-togethers.  I have had a fear of public speaking all my life, and still feel it every time I get up to speak.  It usually doesn’t wash over me in little waves.  It comes at me like a monster wave just before I’m called to go on.  In that moment, I have a choice to let the wave crush me or jump up and ride it.

Waves are powerful and unpredictable. That’s what makes them scary.  I think it’s a mistake to try to manage such a force of nature.  It’s better to let it propel you forward and even let it take you where it wants to go.  No two rides are the same and rarely will you ride straight into shore according to your perfect plan.  You have to allow yourself to make mistakes, knowing that the audience on the beach will still enjoy watching you ride.

Sure… practicing your speaking will help. And practicing in a supportive environment like Toastmasters will help you even more. You’ll develop stronger arms, learn when to paddle at the right time, and when to lean left or right to keep from falling off.  And you will start improving exponentially when you decide to embrace the wave of fear and let it work for you.

One key technique that has helped me ride the wave, especially in speech contests, is to convert the internal nervous energy into outward kinetic energy.  I plant my feet and deliver the first few lines from the power position at center stage, but as soon as possible I make a move left or right, usually when I transition into my first supporting story.  I also like to incorporate “action stories” that lend themselves to active gestures.  The stress energy is transferred to the audience members, who are wondering what’s going to happen next.

Did I ever become a master surfer?  No, but the thrill I felt the first time I rode a big wave into the shore (on my knees, mind you) was something I’ll never forget.  And the first trophy I was fortunate to win in a speech contest was validation that I was surfing on the right wave in my self-development.

Everyone feels fear.  Embrace the wave, and it will carry you.

The bright side

“I’m just sick of it!” my teenage daughter exclaimed from across the dinner table.  She was having a tough time with something and letting the rest of us in on her misery.  Remember when you were young… how you felt the whole world could be against you and you had no power to change it?

In my most fatherly voice, somewhere between Ward Cleaver and Mr. Brady, I said to her, “You could turn your problems into opportunities if you really wanted to.  You know, when life hands you lemons…”

“What?  Throw them at people you don’t like?”

“Uh.  Nooooooo…. you make lemonade. You make the best of a tough situation. Come on…try to look on the bright side.” 

Look on the bright side… now I admit that phrase is easier said than done. Have you ever been in the middle of a really rough day when someone else cheerily suggested you simply adjust your attitude and look at your problems from a new perspective?  Did it hurt your hand when you slapped them?

What does it really mean to “Look on the bright side?”  I suppose this came from early astronomers observing the earth’s rotation, seeing that even when things get really dark, the life-giving sun eventually rolls around and puts you on the bright side of the earth again. It’s the cyclical nature of life – darkness and light, ups and downs, peaks and valleys. 

The ability to strive for the mountaintop when you’re in the middle of a valley is NOT simple.  Let’s keep it real here… 2009 sucked for a lot of people.  But you survived it.  You’re still here.  In addition to listing the difficulties, why not count your blessings and build on them?

Optimism is a choice… your choice.  A new year is a milestone opportunity to look for the bright side, and I’m betting it will come around again.

Top 10 of 2009

Everyone else is doing a year-end countdown, so here is mine.  For the benefit of newer readers, you may have missed one of these ten most visited stories since I started the blog last January:

10.  That’s a stretch – One of many posts dedicated to dedication… and reaching goals you thought you’d never reach.

9.  Brother Max – A colorful character from college with an important message.

8.  Welcome to the jungle gym – One way to get ahead in your career.

7.  Dead air dynamics – Linked from my company’s “Ideas in Motion” blog.

6.  Tiger reality check – It’s safe to say everyone was talking about Tiger Woods that week.

5.  Facebook is not a charity – I’m amazed at the audacity of some people.

4.  You’ll shoot your eye out kid – “Anything, including candy, can be made into a weapon.”

3.  When to stop – Yosemite story – I came close to witnessing a death on Half-dome. I later made the whole climb and took an amazing photo.

2.  Just keep going – An emotional reaction to a kid I met on the train.  I wrote this in 30 minutes with no edits… it just came pouring out.

1.  No shortcuts – Who knew that Charles Atlas was such a highly searched keyword?  Stay tuned for a follow-up on this story coming soon.

Thank you again for reading, commenting and passing along to your friends.  Have a fantastic and fulfilling 2010!

Sincerely,
David Goad

What was I thinking?

Have you ever charged into a challenge without really thinking it through?  Some of the craziest things I did were during my college years, when impulsiveness and immortality often won the battle with my common sense.  My dad always used to say “use your better judgment,” but sometimes I didn’t use any judgment at all.

Like the time I rollerskated 38 miles from West Lafayette to West Lebanon, Indiana on a tiny 2-lane country road WITHOUT a paved shoulder, with large trucks blowing air horns as they lumbered around me.

If you’re wondering about the catalyst for this craziness… yeah, it was a girl.  I was an 18-year old freshman at Purdue, working my way through school as a DJ at the local Skateaway. I was dating a high school senior named Robin, who I had met at the rink.  I would drive the 45 minutes out into the country in my ’71 Monte Carlo to pick her up for dates.  One time I jokingly said that if my car broke down I would just skate to her house.  She rolled her eyes with a laugh of disbelief and said “Yeah right!”

That’s all it took.  Sounded like a dare to me.  I picked a hot Sunday afternoon a couple of weeks later and geared up for the trip – black leather skating boots with lemon yellow outdoor wheels, white tank top, gold silk running shorts and matching headband.  I strapped on a backpack with a water canteen and a handheld radio for music.  I must have looked like a refugee from Olivia Newton-John’s “Let’s Get Physical” music video.

I skated outdoors a lot in those days and was in good shape, but I had never skated more than a few miles at a time around campus.  But it didn’t matter. All I could think about was the surprised look I would see on Robin’s face when I showed up at her door.

I definitely got some surprised looks along the way, from the cars and trucks who had to pass me, to the small group of locals gathered around the Shell station lobby in Odell where I stopped to fill up my water.  They looked at me like an alien had just landed, “Where ya headed son?”

“I’m skating from West Lafayette to West Lebanon and I’m about half way.”

“Uh. OK. I’d say yer half way alright.”

It took me roughly 4 hours to complete the trip.  When I finally got there, my thighs were burning from the strain, and sweat was pouring down my reddened face.  She opened the door, looked at me and laughed.  It took 15 minutes to convince her that it was not a joke, and that I was not hiding my car around the corner somewhere.  Instead of offering praise and adulation, she looked a little perplexed and said, “OK… now what?

Now what?  Gosh, I don’t know.  I had only imagined how surprised and impressed she would be.  I had not anticipated the annoyed look on her mom’s face when she realized she would need to drive me home.  There was no way I could skate back, and we both had school the next day.  Mrs. Andrews and I had a long awkward ride back to West Lafayette while Robin went back to her homework.

So I braved the long, lonely country roads of Indiana, dodging manure trucks and insulting gestures from drivers for what?  Had I actually thought it through, I might have thought beyond the “dare” and used my better judgment before I even started. Because I actually did something really dangerous, and all I received in the end… was a short story to tell.

Without a point.

Nothing personal

When is the last time you heard the phrase “Hey, it’s nothing personal, it’s just business”?  Translation… “Hey, I know I just screwed you over but you should not be mad at me because it’s widely accepted that you don’t have to treat people as human beings in a business environment. So don’t make me feel guilty by acting insulted by my words or actions.”

I guess our ability to separate business and personal all depends on whether we want short-term or long-term results.  Every business encounter with another person is a relationship.  Could be a 5 minute relationship, could be a 5 year relationship… and how you treat that person will determine the results that you get over time.

For example, if you need a contract approved by legal before the end of the month, you can ramrod it through the legal department, ignoring regular processes and procedures, and pull rank or complain to the boss whenever you are met with resistance by the approver.  You will get your results, but you will only get them once. 

If you have an army of counselors to pick from, you can just burn through them one by one at the end of each month without having to bother with the niceties of treating them well.  HOWEVER, if you have one person that you must go through every time, I guarantee they will find a way to put your contract on the bottom of the pile and delay your results. And you know what?  They should.

I work for a large company with a charismatic CEO who calls our company a family.  I have looked in his eyes and believe that he actually means it, and his actions are consistent with his words.  I have also worked for CEOs who saw employees as nothing more than chess pieces on a giant gameboard. 

I believe companies are like families.  The sibling co-workers have their dysfunctional moments, and they sometimes don’t like what their boss parents have to say.  Regardless, they are stuck together in a situation where they will be happier if they treat each other like they want to be treated – being reasonable; saying please, thank you and sorry; offering to help and praising for good work.

Granted, being born into a family is a lifetime contract, and working at a company could only be a 6 month contract. You can also take the job and shove it whenever you want to.  However, just as there are consequences to abandoning your family, there are consequences to leaving a job with unresolved conflicts and burned bridges.

This is why I put extra effort into relationship-building in my job.  I may not be in each job for a lifetime (I got kicked out of the house twice in my life, or “laid off” as they called it) but I have gone into each new job with the attitude that people’s personal feelings are just as important as business results. 

I have my moments of gamesmanship and sometimes put on a gameface to suppress my true thoughts during negotiations or political maneuvering.  But I generally try to treat bosses and co-workers like family.  We have fun, we do chores, we agree, we disagree, we look out for each other.  In any given week, you may be required to spend more time with your work family than your real family. So why not try to be happy when you’re there?

If you derive happiness from wielding power or getting over on people, then this message is not for you.  He who has the gold may make the rules, but often ends up living with the most regrets.  If you want better long-term results, bring the real golden rule into your workplace, and treat people the way you want to be treated.  To some degree… every relationship is personal, isn’t it?

Got a story to share?

The ultimate gift

There I was, running through the Great Mall of Milpitas and the clock was ticking.  Just 4 days before Christmas and I was in hot pursuit of the Ultimate Gift!  You know how every year the news media declares one toy as the hottest and the hardest to find, creating mass panic for shoppers everywhere?  Cabbage Patch Kids.  Beanie Babies.  Tickle Me Elmo. They all paled in comparison to the ultimate gift I was chasing in December of 1993 – the Red Power Ranger action figure!

I had wasted two weeks running around to every mall in Northern California.  I had Grandparents stationed at the back doors of Wal-Mart stores in the midwest.  I spent every night calling classified ads listing 10 times the retail price, but each time I was just a little too late.  I realized I was about to disappoint my 4-year old son Evan.

I tried to break the news gently.  We sat down in front of a crackling fireplace, with the smell of warm sugar cookies in the air.

“Hey buddy… you know how you asked for a Red Power Ranger for Christmas?”

“Uh huh, I want it more than ANYTHING!” 

“Well, Daddy and Mommy have been searching all over, and so many kids want power rangers, the stores have run out. Even Santa’s elves can’t make enough.”

He just stared at me.

“Evan, what I’m trying to say is… you probably WON’T get a Power Ranger in time for Christmas.”

He slowly looked over at the fire, and I fully expected him to start crying.  Instead he turned back to me and said   “That’s OK, Daddy, we’ll just make our own.”  And then he ran upstairs…without even grabbing a cookie!

I looked at my wife Carol, “Oh Lord the boy’s so upset, he’s lost it!  You can’t just ‘MAKE’ a Power Ranger!!”

He came running downstairs 5 minutes later with a handful of markers and some white posterboard.  He said, “Sit down Daddy. You draw the power rangers and I’ll color ‘em in!”

I had to admire his spirit!  I drew all 5 Power Rangers in karate action poses, and he carefully colored them in – red, black, blue, yellow and pink.  I cut out each one with a little base so it would stand up on its own.  The whole project took just 30 minutes, and we made an entire set of Power Rangers… together.

He scooped them up, and started playing with them right away. No trace of disappointment at all.  Lesson from a four year old – my time was worth more than any gift from a store.

Fast forward 15 years and Evan was going off to college.  I was cleaning out his bedroom closet when I found the blue plastic tub filled with Power Ranger toys.  Oh yes, he eventually got the whole set – quick change rangers with rotating torso, karate chop action and matching megazords!

But there in the middle of the tub were the 5 “posterboard” rangers that we made together.  He never threw them away.  It reminded me of the lesson he taught me about how I prioritized my time 15 years ago.

I believe you have more ways to give your time than you may realize… your knowledge, your experience, a shoulder to cry on.  In the next couple of weeks, your moment of truth will come.  Someone will ask for 30 minutes of you.  Will you be able to set aside your search for the Red Ranger and spend time with that person who needs you? 

YOUR time is worth so much more than any gift from a store.

(This post is an excerpt from a speech I originally presented in the 2009 Toastmasters international speech contest. I’m just resurrecting it here in time for Christmas.)

Tiger reality check

I admit it.  I joined in on all the jokes about Tiger Woods’ “transgressions.”  I think I needed to laugh to overcome the absurdity of a hero who has fallen so far, so fast.  He was not just a sports superstar, he was an icon.  Now he is just human.

I stopped laughing at the jokes when I saw a picture of him with his kids, knowing that they will read all this “press” 10 years from now and know every sordid detail about their dad’s weaknesses.  Yeah… I joined the media feeding frenzy and now I feel bad about it.

There’s plenty of amateur analysis going on in the aftermath.  Was Tiger like a child star with an overbearing parent?  As soon as his dad passed away, did he go a little wild and revert to being a child?  Do money and power corrupt absolutely?  Was his marriage just a publicity stunt, carefully crafted to increase his endorsement earning potential?

The Tiger on the Accenture billboards and Wheaties boxes is indeed a powerful brand.  The Tiger behind closed doors in his own home is someone we really don’t know.  Here was an apparently happy and beautiful couple with serious marital problems.  Obviously, money can’t buy you love… or common sense… or peace.

With the speed that media is captured, manufactured and distributed these days, the line between business and personal personas will be blurry.  The line between reality and fantasy will be blurry.  And the line between admiring a hero’s image and tearing down the person is a thin one, and I for one am sorry I crossed it.

As you look up to celebrities, politicians and sports heroes, remember that you are looking at what has been carefully selected for you.  Believe me, I have done enough PR work in my day to know that you can put a positive spin on anything.  You do this mostly by omitting unfavorable details and shifting the audience’s view toward something good.

We should teach our kids about this reality check – that what you see on TV or Youtube is carefully edited and does not include all the facts.  Everyone struggles with happiness, everyone makes mistakes, and true heroism comes from helping others, not helping ourselves. 

This is the comeback I wish for Tiger… not a triumphant return to the Masters, but triumphant growth as a human being.

You have my divided attention

Multi-tasking is not a crime.  For knowledge workers today, it is a survival skill.  If you can’t manage and filter streams of data coming at you from multiple synchronous and asynchronous channels, you are doomed to drift aimlessly at sea.  The ability to keep swimming in a somewhat forward direction requires tremendous effort, and the ability to ignore as well as pay attention.

Time has always been talked about as the most important commodity, with hundreds of books written on “time management.”  With knowledge workers struggling to deal with today’s digital avalanche, I propose that “focus” is the new most important commodity.

If you want focus from colleagues or subordinates on what you have to say, you cannot just demand it anymore.  You have to earn it.  And you have to compete with omnipresent digital devices that make your audience smarter, blur the lines between business and personal communication, and quite frankly, may be more interesting than what you have to say at that moment.

So what can you do about it?  Let’s talk about focus in meetings.  I define a meeting as a gathering of people with a need to collaborate to achieve some common business purpose.  In the old days (choose your own pre-90s decade) mono-tasking people would sit together in a conference room and talk, maybe with a few whiteboard drawings to punctuate important points.  Common courtesy required that you looked at who was talking, listened, waited your turn and then volunteered your opinion. 

Let’s be honest. This courtesy is not common anymore.  People (myself included) not only talk all at once, they bring their world with them to meetings in the form of iphones, blackberries and laptops.  Even though it is valuable to have knowledge at their fingertips, they also have the temptation to sneak quick looks at unrelated items in their inboxes. 

Extending your reach to remote participants via WebEx is a wonderful thing, but presents the challenge of not even being able to see when your audience begins to multi-task. They are sitting in front of computers with other business, entertainment and social media distractions waiting in the wings.

You could yearn for the nostalgia of the old days and label everyone “rude,” OR you could use this as a barometer of your own performance and run your meeting in a new way.  In Dead Air Dynamics, I talked about a few ways to earn focus at the beginning of a meeting.  Now let’s talk about how to maintain focus throughout your meeting.  Of course the size, length and purpose of meetings varies widely, but these general principles apply to most of the meetings I run or attend:

1)     Make a commitment.  Sincerely thank everyone for the time they are investing and ask them for their “focus investment” as well.  Explain the purpose and then commit that you will help navigate to that goal as quickly and efficiently as possible.

2)     Prepare and organize your content.  How many meetings have you attended when the host was winging it?  It’s hard to stay focused on a target when it is not clearly visible.

3)     Establish rules of engagement.  “I have prepared a 10 minute overview that will bring everyone up to speed.  At the end I am going to ask you a few questions.”  Every teacher knows the threat of a pop quiz will snap students to attention.

4)     Use stories to bring it to life.  Even a finance presentation can be made more interesting with an occasional metaphor or personal anecdote.  You can also ask your audience to provide color, “Does anyone have a story that supports or refutes this point?”  This temporarily shifts the burden of engagement from you and lets people know they could be called on next.

5)     Take a breath.  People enjoy monologues on the Tonight Show, but not in meetings.  If you don’t want or need dialogue, why did you call a meeting?  You should be asking a question (and listening) at least once every 5-7 minutes.  If you want to give a speech, record and send it to them so they can listen at their convenience.  Better yet, send it in advance of the meeting so the group is ready to discuss.

6)     Loosen up.  I used to be extremely uptight about people not looking at me or responding to me when I presented.  Once I was giving a marketing overview to a group of sales reps in a conference room.  As soon as I sensed the eyes starting to drift down into digital world, I stopped cold and announced a crackberry break.  “You have 5 minutes to check your inbox and make one quick call.  Then I ask you to come back and give me your full focus and feedback… Go!!”  You should have seen the look of relief in the addicts’ eyes as I let them have their fix.

7)     Give online participants a voice.  The most common question I hear is… “If I can’t see someone’s eyes or body language, how do I know if they are paying attention?”  There is one simple way to know – ask them.  WebEx provides you with a list of participants by name. It’s not just a nebulous conference call where you have to guess who’s lurking in the background.  Go down the list and include every person in the conversation, especially the silent one who is probably sitting on the best idea waiting to be asked.

My final bit of advice is something that has helped me tremendously in my career.  Work on your presentation and listening skills, and practice outside the business environment. I became active in Toastmasters five years ago to raise my game and this kind of coaching could pay off for you too.  When presenting face-to-face, your body language needs to be consistent with your message.  When presenting online, your voice takes the lead role and needs to be delivered with the power and passion of a great radio talk show.

People are judging your content and communication style every second that your mouth is open.  If they sense even for a millisecond that you are boring or disconnected from them, they will tune you out… and they SHOULD.  The truth about multitasking?  It’s a symptom of a greater illness.  Take it as valuable feedback from your meeting audience and tighten up your show.

What tips can you share about making meetings more dynamic? 

(Please submit in Comments below.)

Junk, bonds

I was standing there with three grown men arguing over who had the most useless junk in his garage. 

“I can’t even walk through mine.” 

“I can’t even open the door without junk falling out!”

“I have to hire someone to move out some of the junk so I can see what junk I have!” 

I proudly proclaimed that I had junk I did NOT want to throw away, like my comic book collection, random boxes of souvenirs and the childhood toys my mom saved for me in her attic for 35 years.

One wiseguy challenged me on this.  “You just can’t let go of your childhood.” 

I thought for a few seconds, and immediately flashed back to an episode of Clean House, where I watched the designer try to get this guy to put some of his model airplanes into the yard sale.  He was having a hard time letting go of ANY of them, not for the monetary value… but the value of what they represented.  He built those model planes with his father who had since passed away.  In his mind, throwing out the planes was equivalent to throwing out the memories of long Saturday afternoons with his dad.  Sure they needed more space for the baby nursery, but come on… not the planes!!

Isn’t this why most collectors collect?  It’s not for the potential resale price on ebay.  It’s for the bond or emotional attachment they have to each “junk” object… for what it represents.  I am not ashamed to admit that I have emotional bonds to junk (unlike some other guys who will remain nameless, Paul.)

I built a little toy museum in one corner of my home office.  It includes a walking metal robot I got for Christmas at age 9, a plastic model of Snoopy in a Bugatti racecar, and an original GI Joe from 1970.  One of my most treasured items is a small, round metal serving tray with the state of Florida and Disney World characters painted on it.  It reminds me of my first family trip there at age 10, and the incredible creative inspiration I drew from that experience.  My parents gave me 3 dollars and said I could buy one souvenir before we left. Not sure why I picked a serving tray, but that piece of junk is not going anywhere.

So I guess we need to define “junk.”  Maybe that broken wheelbarrow or leftover carpet sample from your remodel could be called junk, but not your treasured memories.  Paul (oops, sorry…nameless) may be right that I can’t let go of my childhood.  But I say as long as I’ve got the square footage, why should I?

By the way, I know one grown man who has a stuffed monkey he kept from his childhood.  Still trying to verify whether he sleeps with it.

Dead air dynamics

For a DJ, the worst possible disaster is dead air, the agonizing moments of silence when you should be filling the airtime with words or music and there is just nothing. It doesn’t matter if it’s a technical glitch or human error, you can almost feel the impatient audience “tuning out” with each second that goes by. They’re counting on you for continuity. 

Have you ever experienced dead air at the beginning of a business meeting? Whoever’s running the meeting has an obligation to show up, start on time, and lead the participants through the 60 minutes.  There should be a clear purpose, a non-stop flow of information and ideas, and most importantly, a dose of passion, humor or excitement to keep everyone moving forward and on track.  This goes for face-to-face meetings or WebEx meetings.

I’ve joined far too many online meetings where the participants just sit quietly after  joining in, waiting for the host to officially get the meeting started.  This typically creates an awkward 4 minute “dead air” lag as colleagues arrive from other meetings.  If you start your meetings on time, you’ll increase the odds of people showing up on time.  Even so, some will always straggle in late.  Hosts hesitate to start until everyone is there so they can avoid having to repeat anything. 

Why not use this 4 minutes to accomplish something?  Here are three ways to fill the dead air with something productive:

• Review the  meeting agenda written on a whiteboard or a PPT slide so latecomers can catch up later.  Focus on what your attendees will walk away with.  If your audience does not have a clear need for your information, ask yourself why you are having a meeting in the first place.
• Look for a reason to say “good job” to someone in the room or on the call.  There’s nothing like genuine and public praise on a recent accomplishment.  It could even be your boss… say thanks for supporting budget or an initiative important to the team. (Careful not to be a Eddie Haskell brown-noser. “Gee Mrs. Cleaver, that’s a lovely necklace you’re wearing today.”)
• Have some fun – tell a funny short story, ask a trivia question or tell a G-rated joke.  I keep a desk calendar with corny jokes nearby, which I threaten to use every time we start late.  It’s starting to work.

The conclusion of a meeting is extremely important.  You summarize what was done, assign action items and agree on the agenda for the next meeting.  The beginning of a meeting is equally as important.  You set a tone that you’re here to get something done, but you don’t take yourself too seriously.  Sitting quietly seems like a real waste of time.  With my schedule, I have roughly 80 meeting minutes per week to turn dead air into something alive.  Give it a try at your next meeting and let me know what happens.

Share your tricks for making meetings more engaging and effective in the comments below.  Thanks!

P.S. Before you ask… no, that is NOT me in the photo

That’s a stretch

(Click photo for full size)
This is Patterson Pass, a winding road that connects Tracy with Livermore, California.  It snakes through windmill farms and dry pasture, often narrowing to just one lane, and the view from the peak is incredible.  It’s kind of like those desolate roads you see in halftime commercials, where the luxury sportscar whooshes by, stirring up a pile of leaves in its wake.

After running the 2-mile “one tree hill” last weekend, I decided to take on this 7 mile run on Patterson Pass this morning.  It took me 45 minutes to go steadily uphill.  30 minutes to turn around and go back down.  What was I thinking?!  I’ll tell you exactly what I was thinking.  I told myself to keep running no matter what; no matter how short my steps became; no matter how much I had to lean uphill; no matter how much I thought my knees and calves were straining, I was not going to stop.

The giant windmills with their huge propeller blades were still today – like silent sentinel warbirds waiting for battle on a WWII runway.  Other than a redtailed hawk and 2 motorcycles that passed me on the way up, I was the only thing moving on that hill.  It was a cool experience.

I’m setting goals now for things I DON’T think I can do. Let’s call them stretch goals.  Running 7 times around our flat 1 mile lake is something I KNOW I can do.  Running up a steep hill is something entirely different.  With each stretch goal I achieve, I gain a new level of confidence, which in turn gives me faith that I can stretch again.

To those of you thinking about your own stretch, consider this… one year ago I could barely run 2 miles without stopping to walk (and breathing heavily.)  Over the last year, I incrementally worked my way up to hiking Yosemite’s halfdome, running a half-marathon, and now I’m starting into distance trail running.  There was no magic trick.  Each new goal started with a belief and a single step.

How are you going to stretch in 2010?

Hey thanks

So many people are spreading thanks around this time of year.  I see digital shouting in facebook, broadcasting thankfulness to family and friends.  I can also sense silent reflection on what we have… not what we don’t have. It creates a collective epidemic of joy that is having an infectious effect on me.

However, with unemployment still at 10-12% depending on where you live, I know there are a lot of people still hurting from the recession.  If you are the one out of ten who is unemployed or making less money than you used to, I’d like to take a moment to talk directly to you.

I want to thank you for persevering.  I want to thank you for not giving up.  Thank you for living up to your responsibility to just keep going in spite of the odds.  You have more impact on your family and the people in your life than you will ever know, so allow me to remind you of that. That’s something to give thanks for.  That’s something to live for.

I also want to personally thank all of you for what you’ve done for me.  If you hadn’t touched my life in some way, or befriended someone close to me, or helped me out in my job, you wouldn’t be reading this.  You are the small but treasured audience for this blog.  

Thank you for reading and expanding my stories with your comments.  It means a lot to me.

ACTION:  One of the most-read stories on my blog this year was “Just Keep Going”.  It describes an important moment of enlightenment for me, and the amount of comments it received told me it hit home for many of you.  So I have a favor to ask.  Pass this link along to someone you know is hurting or may be having trouble counting their blessings this year.

Have a great Thanksgiving!

One tree hill

I’ve been drawn to trees since I was a young kid, mostly as a climber.  This old tree caught my eye on a hill that I drive by on my way to work.  The tree is interesting because there are no other trees around it.  It’s all alone on this hilltop, struggling against the elements to survive.  The thick trunk is bent over to the point that it defies gravity.

I remember my college photography teacher explaining that seeing a deer all alone in a dry meadow 100 yards away may be exciting when you see it in person, but it doesn’t necessarily make a good photograph.  It’s just a speck of brown in a big field of yellow.  You’ve got to zoom in or walk in for a closer look.

I decided to walk in for a closer look at one tree hill, during a break in my run on Saturday.  I had to jump a barbed wire fence and trudge through snake territory to get there, my running shoes slipping sideways on the steep incline. The hike was worth it.  I looked around from the tree’s point of view to see Tracy in the East and Livermore in the West.  No wonder it was all alone.  This was some great real estate.

The tree is magnificently strong, and must have deep roots to be able to hang on to the hilltop like that.  What was even more amazing was the other side that you can’t see from the road. It was scarred and missing a large chunk due to a giant branch having fallen away.  Half the trunk was hollow at the base, yet it still supported the one heavy branch growing at an impossibly sideways angle.

I reached up and placed a hand on the rough bark of that one huge branch.  I gave it a little shove but it didn’t budge.  I could almost feel the ancient life force speaking to me, saying “Dude, I’m surviving 50 mph winds up here. You’re not going to push me over.”

I wrapped my arms around the branch to measure the circumference, and then laughed at myself when I realized I was actually hugging a tree. Please don’t tell anyone.

If Barbara Walters asked you if you were a tree, isn’t this the tree you’d want to be?  You’d have a strong base, like your deep roots with family and friends.  You’d be a little scarred from previous storms, but still showing your best face to the world.  Bring on the wind, the lightning, the frost, the termites and the brush fires. You’re still standing and you’re still growing.

Impossible is overrated

Philippe Petit does the impossible… just because it SEEMS impossible. You may recognize the name of the man who walked on a tightrope between the World Trade Center towers in 1974, a story you should see in its entirety in the Academy Award-wining documentary “Man on Wire.”  My son Evan and I just had the privilege of hearing Philippe speak in person in a UC Santa Barbara lecture hall.

He engaged the audience with photos and stories of his many highwire exploits, some of them sanctioned by governments, some of them completely illegal.  As I listened to him, I was impressed with his enthusiasm for challenges, and his attitude toward treating the Eiffel Tower as his personal playground.  When he told his friends he felt compelled to walk a wire between the twin towers in New York City, they said it was impossible.  He said, “Yes, it is impossible, let’s get to work on it!”

At the end of his talk he asked for questions from the audience, and I walked up to the microphone in front of the stage. (I’m always interested in how high achievers get themselves back up when they’re down.)  “Philippe, you talked a lot about having faith to get through the challenges you took on.  Can you tell us about a time when you lost faith, and what you did to restore it?”

He thought for just a moment, and then in his animated French accent he said, “You know… when I take my first step onto the wire I am ready to take my last step off the end of the wire as well.  I have prepared for thousands of hours and scrutinized every detail of my plan to build my faith for that first step.  Still, little seeds of doubt fall down on me like raindrops, but I am able to shake them off like a dog because of all that hard work. I have constructed a safety net in my mind that is far stronger than any net I could stretch out below me.”

As I absorbed this answer, I pictured in my mind the raindrops of doubt that pelt me from time to time, and the seemingly impossible challenges that I sometimes face in my life. 

He looked away to the audience for the next question, but stopped and turned back toward me.  As if knowing I needed a little more advice he said, “I am not sure I answered your question, but I’d like to tell you this.  When you look at the great pyramids, you think ‘oh wow, how could those giant things be built by human hands.’  But when you look closer you see that they are made of smaller stones that can be moved around, and smaller still are the grains of sand and clay that make up the stones.  When you take on something big, break it down into parts that you can get started on today and then do it.  That is what will give you faith.”

I’ve been thinking about this since we left the auditorium, and it reminds me of something I learned as a kid in Sunday school.  “God helps those who help themselves.”

Faith does not necessarily mean waiting around for someone else to take your hand or tell you what to do.  Doing the hard work of preparation and having the courage to get started is what sets faith in motion and carries you across the wire. 

What first step can you take today?

Got everything you need?

Just got challenged by my friend and co-worker to “write a blog post on that.”  This challenge came right after I asked him “Got everything you need?” 

Now that I think about it, that really is an impossible, rhetorical question to answer.  No one EVER has ALL of their needs met at any given time, and the needs are constantly changing based on the environment, situation and proximity to other people.

You may remember from Psych 101 the basic needs on the basement floor of Maslow’s hierarchy – food, water, air.  Most of these are met daily for me, with the exception of Spare the Air days and an occasional bad burrito.  So fortunately, I get to spend more time thinking about my needs higher up the hierarchy – self-esteem from achievement, inclusion in social circles and love. 

Some would consider these more wants or desires rather than needs, but I disagree.  Humans need to achieve things in their lives.  Humans need to hang out with other humans.  Humans need love.

Zig Ziglar is famous for the line “You will get all you want in life if you help enough other people get what they want.”  Rebuttal from Mick Jagger, “You can’t always get what you want, but if you try sometimes, well you just might find you get what you need.”  

What are you saying, Mick?  That just getting your needs met is somehow a fallback or compromise?  I think needs may be far more important than wants.  As we know, some people surround themselves with material riches, yet still have an emotional void to fill inside. 

Helping the needy may start with those who can’t feed themselves, but it matters for higher needs like friendship and love as well. The next time someone asks you if you’ve got everything you need, don’t forget to ask them back.

Fight or flight?

We all learn to deal with stress in different ways.  I learned by watching Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom. Remember when Marlin Perkins sent Jim Fowler into the jaws of danger while he provided color commentary from the safety of an armored jeep? 

 “It looks like Jim has successfully gained the crocodile’s attention, and he looks agitated!!  Now Jim has a choice to either wrestle the croc or run for the hills.”

Yes, surviving stress pretty much boils down to one simple question – Fight or Flight? Here’s an example of what I mean… 

 

I spent my early teen years in Kokomo, Indiana, where the landscape is mostly cornfields and country roads. One hot October night my friend and I walked out into one of those fields, plucked some dusty ears of corn and twisted them in our hands until we had a small pile of dry, hard kernels. 

 

Now you may be asking yourself, how much fun can a kid have with a handful of corn?  Well check this out… you hide in the corn 6 rows back from the country road and watch the oncoming car headlights reflecting off the telephone wire above. If you time it just right, you can throw your corn high over the road, rain it down on the windshield and scare the driver witless.  Sounds fun doesn’t it? I’m not proud of it today, but boy was it funny to a 14-year old! 

 

Until the pick-up truck came along…

 

Science lesson – If you’ve ever been in a pickup truck doing 60 miles an hour when a handful of corn hits your windshield… it sounds like God just dumped a bucket of pea gravel on you. Babababababa!! We heard the tires screeeeech, a door slam and the angry voice of a very large cowboy. Like a jilted husband on the Jerry Springer show, he let out a string of profanities so profound that the FCC prevents me from repeating them here. The part I remember with absolute clarity was “I’m gonna shoot your little blankety blank blanks.” 

 

My friend and I looked at each other with wide eyes.  What do you think we picked… fight or flight? 

 

We ran flat out through that cornfield like Kentucky Derby racehorses, cornstalks whipping our faces, tripping over big dirt clods. We ran at least 200 yards until we were stopped by a fence.  And then a really funny thing happened. We looked up at each other and cracked… up… laughing. That crisis shot adrenaline through our bodies, we acted on it, and ran until we couldn’t run anymore. Then we felt a tremendous sense of relief.

 

When faced with a gun-toting redneck, it was a simple choice to run away.  But what happens when you don’t have such a simple choice… like when you feel powerless to fight or run away from stress?  As adults we are often backed into a corner and end up holding onto stress over a sustained period of time without acting on it – like when you are dealing with an overbearing boss, stuck in traffic, or piling too much on your priority plate. This creates all sorts of physical and mental health problems if you don’t release the stress somehow.

 

Now that I am older, I have learned to fight – stand up for myself in conflict, sometimes retreating for a while and then coming back to address it more constructively.  I’ve also chosen flight, but this usually means literally running more often and alleviating stress through exercise.  If I avoid resolving a conflict for too long, the stress is unhealthy to hold on to.  I’ve even got this little pain spot behind my right shoulder that tells me when my stress level is too high. 

 

Everyone experiences stress.  What’s important is what you do about it.  As Marlin would say… “Just as the mother lion protects her cubs, you should take good care of your body and mind.” 

 

How do you deal with stress? 

 

 

True colors

“I see your true colors shining through. I see your true colors, and that’s why I love you.”  Why does this Cyndi Lauper song stop me in my tracks every time I hear it? 

It makes me visualize an old painting, like the ones you see on the antique roadshow.  “My Great Uncle Henry had this up in the garage for 50 years and he just LOVED it. Of course, he did smoke his cigars out in the garage.” 

Layers and layers of gunk have built up on the painting over the years, masking the brilliance of the original colors.  All it needs is some careful restoration and to be brought out for display under museum quality lighting… and it’s priceless. 

Of course, being a man, I would be tempted to just take a powerwasher to it.  But no… restoration is a painstaking process, carefully removing each layer of haze without damaging the original brilliance underneath.

I believe we all start out as masterpieces. Your true colors are the real you, the talents you bring to the table, the dreams you had as a kid.  Over time we build up layers of dirt – creating personas to succeed in business, putting on acts to please other people, putting on masks to protect ourselves from pain.  Revealing your true self is not easy or risk-free. 

I’m finding that the real me is coming out more and more as I get older. It happens when I surround myself with people who love and support me. Just like in the song. Support from true friends gives me the courage to try those things that I think I may be good at, and to spend more time doing things that I love.  If you can find the intersection of those two lists – things you are good at and things you love -you are well on your way to museum-quality pricelessness.

Restoring the real you will take some time. The layers may need to come off as slowly as they built up over time.  And you may need to change the environment, the wall you are hanging on, to start the process.  But there’s no doubt about it… you ARE a masterpiece and your true colors are still there. 

Don’t be afraid to let them show.

What was your name again?

One of my friends asked for the secret to remembering people’s names at a party.  I won’t reveal her age, but she’s old enough to be a little short-term memory-challenged (like me.)  I actually learned a great technique for remembering names early in my career.

1)  Prepare to hear the name (I mean really get ready to receive it when you ask the person for it.)

2)  Repeat the name right after you hear it.

3) Repeat the name one more time before you leave the conversation.

Three impressions really helps cement the name in your memory.

I’ve heard about fancy mnemonic techniques using acronyms, rhymes and such, but this simple 3-step method works fine for me.  The trick is having fun with the way you repeat the name.

Examples:

“Nice to meet you Gerald.  Our family used to visit my Uncle Gerald… until he went to prison for embezzlement.”

“Chuck?  That’s a sick name! What’s UP Chuck?!”

“Terry?  That’s a cool name because it could be for a man or a woman.  Which one are you?”

Nothing warms up a conversation and builds rapport like making fun of someone’s name.  I guarantee this will help your memory, and your new friend won’t forget you either.

The running man

I ran, and finished, my first half-marathon Sunday morning.  I’ve never entered a big race and never run that far in my entire life. Just last year I could barely run 2 miles without stopping to walk. They say 2 hours and 6 minutes is a respectable time for 13.1 miles, and I was fairly happy with the time since my knee was recuperating from a recent injury. 

No… I did not injure it from running.  I injured it while dancing. 

My 19-year old son, at a family party, said, “Hey, my dad knows how to do the running man, he’s from the 80’s. Show ‘em Dad!”

I busted a move alright and also, apparently, a tendon.  It was pretty ironic that it was the “running man” that hurt my ability to run just 2 weeks before the race.

To prepare for this race, I had trained hard for 10 weeks, adding 1 mile each week until I hit 11 miles.  I still wasn’t sure if I could do 13.1 miles on race day without my knee, or me, collapsing.  But I was determined to finish the race whether I was running or hobbling at the finish line.

Right around mile six, I got inspiration from an unlikely source. I saw a little old lady (I’m guessing 70+ years of age) running ahead of me.  She was about 5’ 4”, with dark sunglasses, spandex water belt, a color-coordinated pink running outfit and matching visor.  Barely able to lift her legs much above the ground, leaning to her left side as if her spine could not support her, she was cranking right along at a 10-minute mile pace.  She was consistent, determined and focused on her goal. 

Suddenly my knee didn’t hurt that much anymore.  I smiled, kicked up my tempo and passed her, but kept her image in my mind until the finish line.

I was satisfied to finish with dignity, but my runner’s cap goes off to the athletes who overcame much greater odds than I did (especially the little old lady from Pasadena.)  I learned first hand that what gets you through a big challenge is not just planning and physical preparation. It also takes willpower.  Go Granny, go.

You’ll shoot your eye out kid

A father’s need to turn his son into a man and a mother’s need to protect her young are NOT naturally compatible instincts.  Surely you’ve seen the movie “A Christmas Story,” where little Ralphie tells everyone that he wants an official Red Ryder carbine action two-hundred shot range model air rifle… but what did the department store Santa tell him?  “You’ll shoot your eye out kid!”

Like Ralphie, I dreamed of getting my own BB gun.  My dad thought, “Yeah… learning to shoot will turn you into a man.”  My mom’s opinion? “Learning to shoot… will put your eye out.”

My dad was a member of the Jaycees, a community service organization that raised money for charity and encouraged opportunities for young people.  They also sponsored an annual BB gun shooting contest.  That’s right… a Community service organization putting guns into the hands of kids. Of course they preached “safety first” in their training program; never point a gun at anyone; take out all your ammo when you store your gun.  But for a 10 year old boy - safety may be first, but reckless adventure is a close second.

To participate in the annual shooting contest, my dad bought me my first BB gun.  I was 10… and I was armed.  My brother Jeff got one too.  These Daisy air rifles didn’t have much power – you had to aim 4 inches high so the BB would fall to hit the paper bullseye.  But paper targets got boring after a while. And what do boys do when they get bored?  That’s right, they shoot at each other! 

Now we weren’t stupid.  Reckless maybe, but not stupid.  We discovered that you could shoot a BB directly at someone’s leg from 20 paces without breaking the skin.  It would leave a red welt, but no blood.  So we put on 2 pair of blue jeans, our fluffy “Michelin man” down coats, and we ran outside to “play.”  My red rubber boots crunched on the crusty snow as I snuck around the corner. I saw Jeffy up in the tree.  BLAM… gotcha!! 

Now… for all you moms reading this, I can see your look of horror right through your computer screen.  That’s exactly the same look on my mom’s face when she found out. She said “Give me all the BBs!” and took away our ammo.  The guns could still shoot compressed air but there’s not much fun in that.

Yes, mothers have a need to protect their young, but necessity is the mother of invention.  My brother Jeff was eating a tootsie pop as we sat there staring at our empty guns.  He was getting down to the white sucker stick at the core. (It takes more than three licks by the way.)  Just as he was about to throw it away he stopped.  He noticed the diameter of the white stick was about an eighth of an inch – the same as the opening in the barrel of his gun.  He tore off the mushy chewed up part and slid the rest down into the barrel. He cocked the gun, aimed at the bird feeder and pulled the trigger. BLAM!!  Birdseed flew everywhere.  The compressed air shot that sucker stick at least 30 feet with decent accuracy.

An evil grin spread across his face.  We would not be denied our destructive birthright.  We immediately pooled our money, ran to the Handy Andy convenience store and bought a whole box of Tootsie Pops.  Thus began the great sucker stick war of 1971.  All sugared up with plenty of ammo.

Later that evening, my mom locked our guns in the trunk of her car.

It only took us a couple of months to find the BB guns and BBs again, up on a high shelf in the attic (like a boy is not going to climb up there.)  Jeff said “Come on, let’s go shoot stuff.”  We walked a mile down the railroad track to the garbage dump.  That was forbidden…by our mom…as a place to play.  We climbed over some garbage to set up bottles and cans on the side of an old refrigerator.  I took aim at a Gillette Foamy shaving cream can and knocked it over with my first shot.  I took a second shot at the shiny concave bottom of the can.  Just then some kind of heavy bug flew into my eye and I blinked it off.  I rubbed it a few times and thought nothing more about it.  We headed home to hide our guns in the attic.

A few days later, my eye started to hurt and turn red around my lower eyelid.  I said “Mom I think I might have a bug in my eye.”  My mom was a registered nurse and had no problem pushing gently around my eye with her fingers to see what was going on.  She pushed up with her thumb under my eyelid and Boink!!  A small BB popped out of my eye and bounced onto the bathroom counter.  My mom looked down at the BB.  I looked down at the BB.  I looked up at my mom and said “Now how did THAT get in there?!”

For those of you wondering about the science of this… apparently, when I shot the concave bottom of that can, it hit at the perfect angle to ricochet back straight at my open eye.  I blinked just as it hit my eye, forcing it down into my lower eyelid, where it left 2 little rust spots that had to be treated with special ointment.

I was busted on all counts – the BB Gun, going to the garbage dump, and most importantly, my mom always told me I would shoot my eye out… and I almost did.

So what have we learned today?  Let’s recap.

- Young boys with guns are hard to supervise

- Anything, including candy, can be made into a weapon

- No matter how much you crave reckless adventure… you should always listen to your momma.

Reunited and it feels so good

The word “reunion” literally means “to bring together again.”  But is there actual unity after the initial re-meeting?  My wife Carol and I just attended our North Central High School reunion in Indianapolis, and I’m still energized from it.  The shared educational experience so many years ago was not really a choice for us back then – we HAD to go to school. But this weekend, 225 classmates willfully chose to come together from all over the hemisphere to reconnect.

Maybe it’s because our “first” best friends were made during those formative years.  You try so hard in high school to figure out who you are and what you want to do with your life, and you’re surrounded by peers who are equally hopeful and insecure.  There’s a special bond that emerges when you go through a thrilling or traumatic experience with others, and I think high school qualifies on both counts.

I also admit feeling a bit of plain old curiosity.  I got to see how he or she “turned out.”  Social status and external appearances were so important during teenage years, so I guess I couldn’t help making physical comparisons now.  I wonder if I look older or younger than the majority?  If you haven’t changed TOO much, you get the compliment of “Oh, you look exactly the same!”  Well… I think I looked a little awkward in high school, so is that really a compliment? 

This time I think it was the “internal appearances” that made the real impact on me.  As I talked to each of my friends, shared a few embarrassing war stories, shared photos of our children (all about the same age) and talked about our careers, I felt a sense of unity that came from sheer survival.  We’ve lived through triumph and tragedy.  We’re old enough to know that learning who you are is a lifetime quest, not something you learn in college.  And what you want to do with your life can change, several times, depending on circumstances and your will to follow your heart.  I felt a kinship once again with people I have not seen or talked to in decades.  Facebook has provided a virtual reunion of sorts the last few months, but there’s nothing like looking someone in the eye, getting a hug and celebrating our lives in person. 

I saw guys who I thought would not survive their heavy partying looking quite healthy and happy now.  I heard about a few friends who are sadly no longer with us. I heard about our former class president who is now Chief of Staff for VP Joe Biden.  We are manufacturing reps and marketing execs, comedians and company owners, doctors and decorated soldiers, lawyers and lobbyists, dental hygienists and disaster recovery specialists, attorneys and activists, mothers and fathers. We live in Alaska and the Virgin Islands.  We live on the East coast and the West coast and in the Heartland in between.  We are diversity and unity at the same time. We are the class of ’79.

Special thanks to the organizers of the event.  This Panther appreciates you.

A different drummer

I had an obsession once. I wanted to bang the drum… the big bass drum that sat on top of a player piano at Farrell’s ice cream parlor in the Castleton Square mall.  Long before Chuck E. Cheese baked his first pizza, Farrell’s was THE place for birthday parties, and it was my first real job in high school. 

The waiters and waitresses wore straw hats (really made of styrofoam) and black & white striped shirts with puffy shoulders. It was supposed to look like the gay 90’s (the 1890’s and the original meaning of gay.)  If you were lucky enough to have your birthday at Farrell’s, the waiters would play a siren, bang the drum, play “Roll out the Barrell” on the player piano and serve a giant “Zoo” ice cream sundae for you and your friends. It weighed roughly 25 lbs with 12 flavors of ice cream, chocolate fudge, caramel, nuts, whipped cream and cherries. Sounds like fun, eh?

But I was not a waiter. I was… a lowly dishwasher. Dishwashers did not get to bang the drum or carry the Zoo. I toiled away in my prison – walled in on three sides with grey ceramic tile and stainless steel. There was a narrow horizontal window where busboys slid grey plastic tubs full of sticky dirty dishes for me to wash. 

If you leaned down just right, you could see the colorful world outside, filled with music, laughter and merriment.  But I was on the inside, doing backbreaking work. And as I toiled away, the banging drum taunted me. Every time the elite class of waiters would run to their posts and deliver the celebration, I just lowered my head and scraped glops of leftover ice cream out of half-eaten sundae glasses.

One day I decided I had had enough. I begged the general manager Mr. Merkel to let me out to bang the drum for the next party.  I just wanted to experience a little piece of the happiness going on outside.  Though it was not in my official job description, he told me if I got far enough ahead on the bus tubs…I could run out and play the drum. I was so efficient in the next two hours, I became the first dishwasher to get released on good behavior.  Sweet serendipity!! 

But before I could lay one bang on the drum, Darren the waiter waved me over to the fountain area.  He was actually in need of a second Zoo carrier. I was elated! What an honor to help carry the sacred sundae of all sundaes all over the restaurant, ending on the table in front of the happy birthday girl. (Skip to 5:30 in this old video to see what I’m talking about.)

Fountain noise!  Drum roll!  Player piano! We took off with the Zoo. Up and down the aisles, out into the mall, back through the candy store.  Note: 25 lbs of ice cream in a giant silver bowl needs to be carefully supported on four sides at all times. If just one support point gives way, the ice cream will head that way too. You can guess what happened next.  As I rounded the next corner my world slipped into slow motion.  A slip of the handle in my hand… my partner losing his balance… and the giant silver bowl rolled out of the stretcher, splattering 12 flavors of ice cream and 12 different toppings all over a lady’s skirt.  She looked fit to be tie-dyed.

The player piano continued to play “Roll out the Barrel” as we all stood there in stunned silence.  I rolled out a barrel of fun alright. 

I grabbed a dishtowel that I had stuffed in my back pocket and kneeled down to help clean the mess, quickly realizing that chocolate fudge doesn’t easily wipe out of a yellow linen skirt. As I looked up at the horrified look on her face, all I could do was laugh a nervous laugh and say “Happy Birthday ma’am. No charge for that one.”

Mr. Merkel gave me a dirty look as he took over the rescue effort. I was relieved to get back to the solitude of my dish room for the rest of my shift.  I was only allowed to be a drummer after that but it was enough.  I got to carry the Zoo that one glorious time… all the way to its conclusion on some poor lady’s skirt.  Moments like that, even when they don’t turn out the way you thought they would, make stretching yourself worthwhile.

Related Brush with Greatness:

I actually got to sit next to founder Bob Farrell at a National Speaker’s Association conference dinner in the early 90’s, and I told him this story.  He was amused.  Bob does a keynote speech on customer service called “Give ‘em the Pickle.”

Suburban cowboy

 Do you have one of those childhood photos that you wish would never see the light of day again?  Yes… that is me on the left with my older brother Jeff on the right. 

I wrote a bit of cowboy poetry below, dedicated to my childhood and the spirit of the Old West.

 

 

 

When I was a kid it was a simpler time
In the 60’s, I dreamed I would be
Like Roy Rogers or the Lone Ranger
A’ridin’ the lone prairie.

But life is what happens as you make other plans
And I grew up forsakin’ that dream
Got married, had kids, bought a house in the burbs
And by God my front lawn is real green

I’m a suburban cowboy, no prairie in sight
And I ain’t got no time to be bored
My day’s full a work with a keyboard and mouse
And my horse is a Honda Accord 

Got boots nice and clean, never been in a fight
And I can’t say I’ve shot a man down
But I’ve drawn on a dude in a video game
High score! I’m the best shot around! 

I troubleshoot my computer
And work around ‘most any glitch
Instead of a campfire to sing by
I got a grill with an auto-light switch 

Some folks can relax, raisin’ kids and some cattle
and settlin’ down on a farm
But ain’t no relaxin’ for this workin’ stiff
With a 30 year fixed and an ARM 

When life gets too stressful I do venture out
To a saloon where there’s gamblin’ and drinkin’
OK it’s not really a saloon, it’s an Olive Garden…
At the corner of 12^th street and Lincoln 

Now I don’t want your pity, don’t give me that look
I got the cowboy spirit inside.
And I don’t need no more excitement
‘Cause my life is already a wild ride 

So let’s cut this short, I won’t waste your time,
I’ve still got some spreadsheets to do
I hope you find what you’re lookin’ for…
Happy Trails from me to you!

Where I come from

Revisiting a childhood home can be an emotional experience.  After you get over the difference in scale (not as big as you remember it) you’re transported back in time to relive memories you thought were long gone.  I recently got to visit my childhood home at 802 S. Lafayette Street in Macomb, Illinois, and I had not seen it since age 11 when we moved to Indiana.

There in splendid detail was:

- the window to my old bedroom
- the buckeye tree I used to climb
- the front sidewalk where I skinned my knee after falling off my clip-on steel roller skates
- the porch window where the Christmas tree sent a warm glow out onto the snow-covered evergreen bushes
- the white-painted front door that swung open the night my dad surprised us in his Santa suit
- the picture window I used to look out to see when my brother Jeff got home from Kindergarten
- and the sloping backyard that we used to roll down just for the fun of it.

I wanted to knock on the front door and get a tour of the inside, but it felt like a line I shouldn’t cross.  As I stood in the front yard and took a picture of the house, it hit me… how much it had NOT changed.  Other than some peeling peacock blue paint, it was mostly the same as we left it.  Maybe this is just a small town phenomenon. In California, old stuff gets torn down and new stuff gets built on the lot. 

Time had not really touched my old home, and it reminded me of the permanence of things. Not just the house, but the permanence of the values I learned growing up in Macomb in the 1960’s – be nice, help others and treat people the way you want to be treated.  Simple rules, really.  No matter what mask or game face I put on in my job today, I cannot escape that part of me…instilled by a loving family and a community that protected its own.

Life is not perfect in a small town. OK…sometimes it can be more Norman Bates than Norman Rockwell. But I choose to recall the best parts of my childhood and draw strength from them, including celebrations of happy times, lessons learned the hard way, and the importance of self-reliance and accountability.

As we drove out of town, we passed the brick courthouse and town square that looked remarkably like the one in the movie “Back to the Future.”  That’s where I was headed alright, back to the future and my current life in the fast lane.  

I love big cities and big city people, but some folks here on the coast jokingly call the heartland of America “flyover country.” If that’s the way they see it, then I hope they keep flying over and don’t stop.  The permanence of the people there, their families and the way they treat each other is something to be celebrated… not mocked.

Growing up in a small town was an important cornerstone for who I am today. And knowing where I come from helps me stay on track for where I’m going.  Have you revisited where you came from?  What memories do you choose to hold on to?

Brother Max

“You’re aaaallll sinners! Repent before it’s too late!!” 

I turned to see where the voice was coming from.  I was late for my freshman psychology lecture, but I had to see what was going on.  There in the middle of the grass mall was a large circle of 50 students with a skimmer straw hat moving slowly in the center.  I rollerskated up the sidewalk (hey it was the 80’s) as the crowd shouted at the man in the middle.  That’s when I first laid eyes on Brother Max.

Brother Max was a traveling preacher.  He was in his late 50’s, and wore a white seer sucker suit with suspenders and a yellow bow tie. He reminded me of one of those snake oil salesmen that wandered from town to town in the old West.  But Brother Max was not selling snake oil.  He was selling Christianity.  And now, like a single gladiator in the middle of a great coliseum, he was inviting the crowd to clash with him in a war of words.

At first I was amused.  He danced around on his soapbox (OK, plastic milk crate) and alternated between reading scriptures from his beat-up old bible and rebuking random members of the audience.  The audience alternated between booing and laughing. I admit I laughed at the spectacle too, until Brother Max walked up to a young sorority girl proudly displaying three Deltas on her pink sweatshirt, and said, “Yooooouuu are a prostitute, and yer going to hell if you don’t repent.”

Whoa! Now hold on a minute. I am a Christian and this was not the tolerant, respectful religion I grew up with. This guy was going WAY over the top and inciting the crowd with hostility.  I somehow felt like they were laughing at my faith now, and suddenly didn’t feel like being silent anymore.

“Hey, you don’t know her!!” I shouted, apparently loud enough for Max to hear from across the circle.  He wheeled around and looked right at me.  The crowd got quiet as he took six long exaggerated steps toward me and stopped six inches from my face.  I could see the fire in his eyes through his thick glasses, not unlike looking through the bottom of two rootbeer mugs.  He smelled like an odd mix of cotton candy and beef jerky.

He growled, “And you’re going to Hell too, boy.”

Everybody laughed at the theatrical display, but then got really quiet and turned to look at me.  Was I going to respond, or back down?  Not wanting my religion to be mocked anymore, I expressed myself, eloquently,

“You’re an idiot!”  The crowd emboldened me with a laugh.

Brother Max came right back with, “You’re a blasphemer!”

I shouted a little louder, “You’re a blowhard!!”

The crowd roared again. It had now grown to over 100 people.

Brother max escalated “I challenge yeewwww to repent of your sins!!”

All the expectant eyes were upon me.  To this day I’m not sure where it came from inside me, but I shouted “Well, I challenge you… to an arm-wrestling match!”

This got the biggest laugh of the “show.”  I looked left and right, congratulating myself on my quick wit, but Brother Max was not ready to give up.

“Come on bring it, little man.”

Excuse me?  Did he just accept my challenge to an arm-wrestling match in front of 100 people?! There was no backin’ down now.  I threw aside my backpack and said, “You’re goin down, Brother Max.”

Now picture the absurdity of the scene for a moment.  Here was a 50-something man in a white seersucker suit and yellow bow tie, lying down in the grass to arm-wrestle a freshman wearing a Purdue sweatshirt, blue jean shorts and rollerskates.  Brother Max was short but stocky, probably outweighing me by 80 pounds. My skinny arms were about half the size of his. I was not optimistic about the outcome, but there was no backing down now.

The crowd closed in and counted down from 10 like a rocket launch.

10 – 9 – 8 – 7

His hand felt like a big hairy catcher’s mitt, and I gripped the best I could.

6 – 5 – 4

He glared at me through those rootbeer mugs, magnifying the fire in his eyes.

3 – 2 – 1 – Go!!

The battle didn’t last long.  I put up a 10-second fight before he turned his wrist and slammed my arm back into the grass.  The crowd cheered and booed at the same time.  Then something unexpected happened – Brother Max didn’t immediately let go of my hand.  He held on for a few seconds more, as a big smile curled across his lips.  He whispered something I’ll never forget, “I’ve got their attention now, don’t I boy?”

Max got back up on his milk crate to preach and I slinked away to my Psychology class. My Christianity was still intact but my pride… not so much. I was now known as “that guy who arm-wrestled Brother Max and lost!”

But the story doesn’t end there.  An hour later, after my class, I was rolling by the mall.  There was no longer a crowd in the grass, but I saw Brother Max under the shade of a big oak tree, talking quietly to a group of four students.  I couldn’t hear what they were saying, but he was handing them small bibles and turning to specific pages for them to read.

Is it possible that crazy Brother Max was really a marketing genius, creating a scene in order to be heard?  Was he simply demanding attention from the many to really reach just a few?

There are 2 lessons I took away from my run-in with Brother Max. Take your pick:

1)     Don’t let your alligator mouth get your hummingbird butt in trouble.

2)     First impressions, and intentions, are not always what they seem.

For that lesson, and for the four other students he reached that day, I say… thank God for Brother Max.

Crap sandwiches

Social media allows anyone to connect directly to authors and thought leaders and have unfiltered conversations that were just not possible in the past. I just had a lunchtime exchange on Facebook with Larry Winget, author of the upcoming book “No Time for Tact.”  A self-described pitbull of personal development, Larry’s in-your-face, direct style can be equally off-putting and refreshing. It’s shock value with a point, and I like it.

Here’s our brief wall conversation following this posted book excerpt:

“Constructive criticism is a stupid concept. To construct means to build up. To criticize is to tear down. You can’t do both at the same time. Pick one (from “No Time For Tact.”) I also wrote about the Crap Sandwich concept in my book. Any way you slice it, at the end, you still have the taste of crap in your mouth. Better to just give it to people straight. We spend way too much time trying to soften the blow and don’t end up serving people well at all.”

Really?  Personally, this goes against everything I learned from my parents, school, church and Toastmasters. And hey, I’m from Indiana. People from Indiana grow up nice. I felt compelled to throw in my two cents…

“Larry, I agree that criticism tears down in preparation for building up. The key is asking someone if they want it before you just dump it on them. ‘Would you like my opinion on how you can improve?’ If they say no, be prepared to walk away.”

“David, if they work for you, you don’t have to ask, it’s your obligation to criticize their work. If they don’t work for you, I have discovered it is best to wait until they ask you. People don’t want to change any way or they already would have so why put yourself through the grief of “helping” them? It’s a waste of time and effort for everyone.”

“Good point Larry. In my experience though, I see so much crap rolling downhill for everyone at work, I find it helps morale to get it in “sandwich form” occasionally   I have also found some people willing to change, starving for help, but afraid to ask. So I volunteer my humble advice. Some say yes, some say no thanks.”

“David, your point is well taken.”

I share this with you because:

A) It shows that Larry Winget is reasonable and willing to have an intelligent conversation with his readers, and

B) I really want to know what you think about Larry’s claim above, “We spend way too much time trying to soften the blow and don’t end up serving people well at all.”  Do you agree?

The other side of the board

“Come on, you can do it!  Break the board!  Break the board!!“

My best friend Jeff Bagby was coaching me on martial arts in the basement of his house in Kokomo, Indiana. It was the early 70’s and Kung Fu was at its popularity peak, fueled by primetime TV shows, movies and comic books.  I was looking for a little self-defense insurance.

I lined up my arm and gently touched the piece of scrap wood with the base of my palm.

Jeff held it firmly between his outstretched and locked arms.  “Come on, break the board!”

I stared at the wooden surface as I rotated my torso and retracted my arm.  I screamed out “Hie-yahhhh!!” as I punched forward as fast as I could.

I screamed out “Yee-oucchh!!!” as my hand bounced off the board, sending a shockwave of pain up through my shoulder.

“OK… OK. Here’s what you’re doing wrong.” Jeff patiently explained.

“You are focusing too much on the surface of the board. You have to focus on a spot 12 inches on the other side and punch THROUGH the board, not AT it.”

He held it out once again, and I visualized punching through all the way to his stomach (which would be a nice payback after the pain he just put me through.)  I took a deep breath, pulled back, let loose and CRACK!!  The board split as I almost fell forward into coach Jeff.  My disbelief turned into a satisfying smile.  Nobody was going to mess with ME on the school bus!

Funny how these little defining moments stick with us.  Sometimes when I’m having trouble breaking through an obstacle in my life now, I try to visualize what it will be like after I succeed.  I picture what it will look like on the other side of that board.  Then I stop punching AT the problem and punch through it instead. After all, seeing is believing.  And if I am not able to really SEE my success in advance, I don’t really BELIEVE it in advance.

Are you having trouble getting through an obstacle in your life? Maybe try adjusting your vision beyond the short-term and focus on where you will be after you succeed. Trust me… it makes it a lot easier to break through.

Taking the hill

There was a light rain followed by a sharp temperature drop, and fresh icy snow had formed all the way up Salisbury hill. There were other ways I could have gone home, but I wanted to take this shortcut.  My beloved ‘71 Monte Carlo had plenty of power – a 400 cubic inch engine with a Holly 4-barrel carburetor (environmentally-friendly at 6 mpg in the city, 9 on the highway.) It had shiny Cragar rims on wide racing slick tires – great on hot Indiana asphalt; nearly useless at getting traction in the snow.

I thought if I just got enough momentum at the bottom of the hill, surely I could make it to the top. My girlfriend Carol said “You’re not going to make it.”  Well, chalk it up to 19-year old macho, but I took this as more of a challenge than a warning.  I punched it and charged up the icy hill.  About a third of the way up I noticed the car was starting to slow down. And the harder I stepped on the gas pedal, the slower we went.  I floored it with the speedometer buried at 120 miles per hour, but I could see out the frosty window that we were only doing about 2.

Apparently my slick back tires were spinning so fast they were able to burn their way down through the ice, and grab just enough of the asphalt pavement to get a grip.  The engine was whining and the tires crying out for help, but we were inching our way up that hill.  That’s when I realized how deep I was into this commitment.  If I were to let go of the gas and hit the brakes, I would just slide backwards out of control, and surely hit a tree or a parked car. I had to keep going.

When the hill finally leveled out at the top and I could let off the gas, I yelled out “YES!!”  in triumph.  Then I looked over at Carol who had dug all 5 fingernails into the imitation leather arm rest.  She didn’t have to say a word.  I got the glaring look that screamed “Don’t you EVER do that again!”

That’s when it really hit me about the risk I took. I could have slid back down, crashed and injured us both. I could have blown up the engine.  Was it really a good decision to take that hill?  Actually, it was not a decision at all.  It was an emotional burst of stupidity.

Have you ever charged into something at full speed before REALLY thinking it through?  Of course you have.  Motivational experts tell us all the time to take a chance, take a risk… nothing ventured, nothing gained.  But the older we get, the more our experience and intuition drop hints about what could cause failure. 

This is exactly my point.  There is nothing wrong with listening to your intuition before you hit the gas.  It’s a built-in check and balance system.  If something is bothering you in the back of your mind before you start, take a moment to bring it to the forefront and deal with it.  Because once you go with the emotional charge up the hill, you just might get yourself in deep before realizing you have no traction.

I’ve learned plenty of things the hard way in my life, but I’m finally starting to get it.  Call it intuition, call it conscience, call it God whispering in my ear…. I’m better off when I listen first, act second.

Yosemite #2 – A little insurance

 
My first attempt at climbing Yosemite’s Half Dome was a failure – I had to retreat in the face of bad weather. Many of you said I did the right thing in turning around, and that the mountain would always be there for a second try.  Honestly I wasn’t sure I wanted to.  The climber who fell to his death not long after my first retreat still haunted me.

Trying again after failing is easier said than done. “Get back up on that horse” you’ll hear from your friends. “If you wait too long it will get worse.” 

When my 19-year-old son Evan said he wanted to do the climb, my first impulse was “no way!”  How could I allow my only son to take a risk like that?  Then again, if he was old enough to do it himself anyway, perhaps I could be there to make sure he was safe.

 

So we set out yesterday on the 18-mile hike and succeeded in reaching the summit this time!  But it was not without a little insurance.  I bought a couple of 8-foot black webbing straps and offset caribiners at REI, so we could clip onto the cable in between each post. (NOTE: the steel cable diameter is slightly less than the width of a quarter. Use a quarter to test the caribiner you buy. Also use gloves that are thin enough so you can operate the clip easily.)

 

Now I was prepared.  If I slipped during the climb or if someone else fell into me, the waist strap would stop my slide.  I still felt like I was literally hanging on for dear life, but that clip provided enough peace of mind to enable me to go all the way.  On the way down, I was even confident enough to create camaraderie on the cables, giving little pep talks to the other climbers around me.  By the way, my son was never afraid, going up or down. Ah, the immortality of youth.

 

This is the point… experience can be a double-edged sword.  It can make you fearful when you have seen just how bad things can be.  But learning from other’s experience can also help you achieve more than you’ve ever dreamed.  It just took a little online research and discussions with other experienced climbers to help me try again and reach that new level.

 

The photo above says it all.  That’s Evan and I standing on the edge of the top of the world.  I was able to draw courage from experience, and it was SO worth it to try again. May you reach the same heights in your lifetime. 

See more photos from my trip, and send me a friend request in Facebook if you want to keep up with each other’s journeys