Category Archives: Wise Words

Regrets? I Have a Few…

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Last weekend, we viewed 4 Oscar-nominated short films.  Three of them have lingered with me all week, because of their subtle insights into human nature and the thorny topic of regret, which can mire us down in bitterness or anger or motivate us to break through our fears, often with surprising results.

The Irish film The Shore reminds us that the regrets originating in young adulthood shouldn’t be carried like baggage for decades without first checking our youthful assumptions. The Norwegian film Tuba Atlantic reminds us to live, truly live, and not  collect regrets, which can weigh us down with fear, anger, and sadness until it’s almost too late. And finally the American film Time Freak, reminds us that the wish to go back in time and correct our mistakes is a foolish and comical waste of brain power and energy.   If you have the chance to view them, I’d love to hear your thoughts.

From Excuses to Action

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In part 2 of my post “What’s Your Excuse?” we’ll focus on how to move from making excuses to taking action.  A very practical solution is outlined in the book Five Steps To Overcome Resistance to Change, by Harvard professors Robert Kegan and Lisa Laskow Lahey.  Their five-step process is straight-forward, logical, and easy to follow.  In this post, I’ll outline the authors’ 5 step process and use my own experiment in breaking down the excuse barrier as an example.

First, I took a sheet of paper, divided it into 5 columns, and labeled with the titles shown below.  (If you are like me and find it easier to type than write, you can create a table in Microsoft Word.)  In the first column, I recorded my current behavior, noting what did or didn’t happen as a result of my assumptions.   In my case, I noted my habit of relegating my writing and other creative projects to the weekends.   I had plenty of excuses.  I commute, I work from 8:30 to 5, most nights, I’m tired when I come home…and so on.   As a result, my creative projects are squeezed into free time on the weekends.   In  the second column, I jotted down experiences or other evidence that might cast doubt on the validity of my assumption.  In my case, I noted that I had taken photographs of a sunset, for example, after work.  That evidence disproved my belief that I didn’t have the time or energy to work on creative projects during the week.  I also noted that I wasted some of my free time by watching too many re-runs on TV.
Current Behavior Contrary Evidence Explore the History Test the Assumption Evaluate the Results  
I tell myself that I can only write and do other creative projects on the weekends and I don’t have time during the week.  As a result, I’m frustrated when I’m busy on the weekends and don’t have time to “indulge” in creativity.  This is not healthy for me and makes me difficult to live with! Is it true I have no free time during the week?  In fact, I spend far too much time watching reruns on TV in the evening.  I could use that time to write or edit photos even if it’s just for half an hour.  Occasionally, I have also used my free time during the week to take photographs. I believe that I can only do creative projects when I have the right conditions—enough sleep, enough time, enough quiet.  This assumption took root in my 20′s when I was working, commuting, and going to grad school. In the evenings, I have started editing photos on my laptop.  Even if the T.V. is on, I can still concentrate on editing.  I’m also reading during my lunch hour, to get background information for a new writing project. The conditions aren’t always ideal, but there are some creative projects that I can do during the week.  This makes me feel satisfied and creatively fulfilled on a more regular basis.

Step 3 is to explore the history of this assumption.  How and when did the assumption(s) take hold?  In my case, it started many years before when I was working, commuting, and going to grad school.   Back then, I believed  that I needed to devote many hours at a stretch to writing or other creative projects and I couldn’t squeeze them into an “ordinary” day.

The next step is to test the assumption in a safe environment, which allows me to “escape” from the situation if I began to feel uncomfortable or uneasy.  In my case, one night after work, I took a series of shots of a beautiful sunset and on another night, I edited photos while watching TV.  I also started bringing a book to work, so on my lunch hour, I could do some preparatory work for a new writing project.

The final step is to evaluate the results.  My little experiment worked.   It gave me an alternate way to think and act  Even devoting a few minutes in the evening to photography or reading on my lunch hour left me feeling happier and more satisfied during the week.  My change was relatively easy and safe, however.   The authors caution that this is not an easy process, and tackling problems head-on in this way can be painful and challenging. However, it has been tremendously rewarding to understand the “old” assumptions were blocking me from acting.  It was liberating to bring my resistance to the surface and try out new tools to cope with an inner conflict that was preventing me  from achieving my goals.  If you try it, let me know whether it works for you too.

Source:  THE REAL REASON PEOPLE WON’T CHANGE
Robert Kegan and Lisa Laskow Lahey

Gratitude

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It’s rare that my New Year’s resolutions “stick.”  In fact, I’ve practically given up making them.  But this amazing 9-minute movie by Louie Schwartzberg has me thinking about the new year in a different way.  His movie has me wondering how often we show our best selves to the world.    If you’re like me, it’s not often enough.  All too often, I am more consumed with petty worries, fears, and concerns that take my mind off the present and close me off to beauty, wonder, and other people.   Perhaps, like me, those rare moments of gratitude, of beauty, of joy circle through your mind from time to time.  Perhaps, like me, your moments still have the power to make you pause.  Perhaps, even in your distant memories, those moments still fill your chest with a singular feeling of wonder, of joy.  Perhaps you were running on a country road on a spring morning in the rain, and the smell of new grass filled the air with the promise of summer.   Or perhaps, you were standing hand-in-hand with someone you love on a beach at sunrise, the waves curling around  your feet.  Or perhaps you were holding your brand-new son or daughter, marveling over the perfection of every finger, every toe.  Did you in these moments, pause in wonder and gratitude and murmur, “Oh, my God?”  Do you think of these moments as rare and precious gifts?

As we end one year and begin a new one, I have watched Louie Schwartzberg’s 9-minute movie a half dozen times.  In it, Louie, a filmmaker who specializes in time lapse imagery, gives us a preview of his latest film project “Happiness Revealed,” an exquisite and awe-inspiring tribute to nature, human kind, and the gifts we can all receive every day–if we only open our eyes and hearts to others and to nature.   And so, my resolution this year is to follow Louie’s advise and try, as often as I can, to sweep the detritius of worry, impatience, fear, and anger from my mind and face each day with an open mind and heart.   To paraphrase the wonderfully wise older man in this film, if we approach the new day in this way, our  joy and gratitude will flow from ourselves to others through our “eyes, smile, touch, and (our) presence.”

How Can You Think of Beauty at a Time Like This?

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Right before Thanksgiving her husband died, leaving her alone with two small children.  I knew Sara* from work, a tall, intelligent and lovely woman in her early 40’s, who managed to come into the office even when her husband was on hospice care.  I admired her strength and courage.   But she deflected my compliments, admitting that going to work was her respite, a mental break.  Still, I wondered how she had the fortitude and presence of mind to focus on the details of running an office, given her situation.

At his funeral, she was tearful, yet composed, even though men and women were crying around her.  After the service, we gave each other a long hug.  She listened intently as I managed to find some meager words of comfort.  How could I begin to help her?  A husband dead at 47?  Two children under the age of 12 who depended on her?  Her needs and worries had to be vast and overwhelming.

A few days after the funeral, a co-worker, (I’ll call her Judy) started a collection for Sara.   We signed the card.   I was certain the money was going to be put to a practical use—such as a college fund for her children.  But instead, Judy had purchased a large pane of stained glass.   She explained, “I was shopping with Sara last summer and we saw it in a store window.  She fell in love with it.  It meant something to her.”  I nodded and contributed some money, but privately I questioned her decision to buy something so frivolous, so irrelevant.  How could such a gift help  assuage some of Sara’s fears, concerns, and needs?  How could it truly help her?

Two weeks ago, Sara came back to work.  She was smiling, but pale.  A few of us gathered around her and Todd, one of the VPs, announced, “We have something for you.”  Judy stepped forward, revealing the large panel of stained glass patterned with sunflowers, gleaming green and gold in the light.  At first, Sara simply stared.   “I can’t believe you did this,” she murmured, her eyes filling with tears.  “You have no idea…. It’s beautiful.”

“You can hang it in your living room window,” one woman offered.

“Look at the colors when the light hits it,” said another.

Sara nodded, her head low, fumbling for composure.  One woman put her arms protectively around her.  Another handed her tissues, creating a circle of comfort while Sara cried.

Her reaction surprised me, but as I thought more about it,  I realized I had forgotten one important  truth…that even in times of pain and suffering, it’s important to remember beauty.

Etty Hilesum, a Dutch writer during the Holocaust, echoes this in her diary.  She writes that friends chided her for buying tulips one spring day in 1944 when the Nazis were filling the streets of Amsterdam.   “How can you think of tulips at a time like this?” one of her friends demanded.  In her diary, Etty had written that in times like this, times of great darkness and despair that we must remember beauty.  In fact, she wrote, we need it now more than ever to remind us that goodness and beauty still exist in this world.  This is what Sara already knew and what I have learned from her, in her grief.

* Not her real name.

On the Road of Good Intentions

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The party season has begun.  Before we know it, we will be facing January, that month of contrition, when we resolve to undo the excesses of November and December.  Contrition often takes the form of  New Year’s resolutions.  They remind me of soda cans, soon discarded along the road of good intentions…that ancient, long, and well-traveled road, worn smooth by many shoes. Like many of us, I have made and abandoned these resolutions and felt worse for it.  Despite this, I keep making new ones.  One change I need to make is to cut down on refined sugars.  But every day, when I’m making my morning cup of tea, I slide my teaspoon into the sugar bowl, and my mind plays the same script narrated by my own little Glinda, the good witch, who debates my Wicked Witch of the West.

Glinda: “You know you should eat less sugar.”

Wicked Witch of the West:  “I know I should, but I love that jolt of sweetness first thing in the morning.”

Glinda:  “You really should cut back.  You know sugar isn’t good for you.”

WWW: “I know, I know, but it’s just one little teaspoon.  What’s one teaspoon?”

Needless to say, the Wicked Witch  often wins. But the fact remains that my Glindas, or good intentions, are not enough to change my behavior.  This mental battle is explained in the book Switch:  How to Change Things When Change is Hard by Chip and Dan Heath.  The authors argue that our minds are  ruled by two systems:  the rational and emotional. In my little script above, my Glinda would be my rational mind and the Wicked Witch would be my emotional.  Therefore, I need to engage both Glinda and the Wicked Witch (my emotional  love of sweets).  Their compelling argument, supported by decades of research in psychology and sociology and case studies from business, health sciences, education, and the government, shows how to support the structure of lasting change.  The Heath brothers give detailed examples of how to engage our rational minds, motivate our emotional system, and structure a path that will lead to the final destination or goal.  In their chapter on “Overcoming Obstacles,” I can quickly find my problem:  “I know what I should be doing, but I’m not doing it.”  Their diagnosis and advice?  1)  My rational mind is on board, but I have an emotional problem.  I am not convincing my Wicked Witch (lover of sweets) to jump on the bandwagon; 2)) I can start out small and think of one tiny change that I can make right now, which will get one step closer to my goal;  3) I can change my “path” by making a change in my environment so that I’m “forced” to change.  For example, I could stop buying sugar or I could replace sugar with Stevia;  4)  And finally, I can enlist the help of someone else so we can reinforce the new behavior.

I have decided to choose option 2–starting out small.  I am going to gradually decrease the amount of sugar I use every day.  So instead of 4 or 5 teaspoons over the course of a day, I’ll use 2 …or 2.5.  I will keep you posted on my progress!

Now, here’s a question for those of you who have made a positive change this  year.  Why is it working?  Share the secret of your success at:  

If you’d like to take a look at the Heath brothers’ book, here the link:  http://www.amazon.com/Switch-Change-Things-When-Hard/dp/0385528752/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1322413303&sr=1-1

Walking the Roman Ruins