Lifestorming, page 16
If for no other reason than the ever-observing children, we need to think carefully about legacy, not in terms of some distant bequest, but rather in daily terms of lessons and morality.
The family dinner has all but disappeared. Extracurricular activities, dual-working parents, electronic games and diversions, sports, and a myriad of other distractions have ended nightly discussions over a meal. We were poor, but I nonetheless listened to my parents try to decide how to pay the bills, whether or not to seek new work, and how to handle difficult family members. I was also able to hear from them about my school challenges, other kids cheating in class, and unfair treatment.
The individual role models we provide are more crucial and far reaching than ever before.
Thus, we do have to acknowledge that there is a need to create models and examples, avatars of conduct. That's what we mean by legacy being written every day and not simply at the end of one's life or involvement with others.
The decisions and behaviors you choose to engage in every day are the woof and warp of your legacy. Just as there are athletes, entertainers, politicians, researchers, business leaders, and others whose legacy we can appreciate daily, there are people in our lives doing the same thing, though we may not realize it as such. Consequently, we are (or are not) providing similar episodes in our legacy daily for others around us.
If history holds true, some of you reading this book will contact us and let us know of the change it made in your lives. Some of you will recommend it to others. We write our books with that clearly in mind. We don't recommend fads, or simply emulate others' works, or experiment in our pages. Our responsibility is to help you to improve your lives by carefully adding to our own legacy.
That's not selfish, that's a contribution!
What contributions are you making? The Kantian categorical imperative applies to positive behaviors as well. We've witnessed pay-it-forward and gift-it-forward movements on social media, as well as viral appeals for charitable giving (e.g., the ice bucket challenge). What if everyone did what you did in terms of being generous, providing help, donating time and money, spending time with your family, admitting mistakes and apologizing, maintaining your health?
In Japanese society, there is chaos in the subways, with professional pushers helping to pack the cars inhumanly full. Yet on their bullet trains, the cars stop perfectly at particular spots on the platform and people board in an orderly fashion with no problem or inconvenience. Even within one culture, we can find significant examples of differences in conduct.
So we ask you here perhaps the most important question in the book: What are you doing now, today, to build your legacy while on your evolutionary journey? It will seldom be one grand gesture, and will more probably be a continuing series of positive actions that not only help you and help others but provide a lasting guide for others to use along their own journeys.
Lifestorming is about taking on life and enjoying it immensely by contributing to it enormously. We hope we've enhanced your journey by sharing lessons of our own.
Notes
1. One of my favorite stories is about her stopping to play one of the ubiquitous pianos in a Ritz-Carlton hotel. A security guy came over and told her that she couldn't play the piano. “Apparently, I can,” she replied, continuing with her music.
2. YouTube is probably the largest of the social media platforms; it has somewhat more depth because it is visual, but it is also one of the sites with the most obscene and profane communications.
9
Self-Mastery: The Lifestorming Field Guide to Your Successful Journey
Over decades of coaching others, we've found that there is a discernible, practical difference between those who make little headway after learning new techniques and those who absolutely rocket forward past others, having found new fuel and vigor. We've included this chapter as our admonition to be among the latter, including our best practices as to how to do it.
If you truly wish to apply our principles of Lifestorming to your own journey—and you're on a journey whether or not you've acknowledged it, despite its direction, speed, or progress—then these are the distinguishing features of those who are most successful in that pursuit.
Apply the learning immediately, right now, without any waiting. You can't wait for “the right time” or “the proper situation.” You must proactively seek an immediate use. For example, if you wish to focus on building aspects of character, choose the trait most important and find resources to help you improve right now. If you want to examine the relevance of your beliefs and values, write them down and ask if they represent your current thinking. If you want to change and/or enlarge friendships, describe the people you'd like to have for friends and find a way to meet them.
Share your intent. An important aspect of creating accountability is to include others in your plans so that they can inquire about progress (as well as help you with it). We mentioned earlier that people who have overweight waiters tend to order more food, and those who watch others exercise tend to exercise harder themselves. Find people who have made significant changes, who are on their own journeys, and become accountable to them as well.
Pursue success, not perfection. Don't allow a setback to overturn the entire cart. Not everything will work perfectly, you'll have some nonsuccess, and you'll get frustrated (“I'm still self-editing too much.”). That's okay. Acknowledge now that the journey has obstacles and can be slower going at times; just don't allow them to lead you to the off ramp. Be resilient, and use setbacks as learning opportunities that support future successes.
Journal and record. In the mornings, take a minute to tell yourself what you're going to accomplish, and in the evenings tell yourself what you have accomplished. Use a hard copy, electronic, or audio journal to record your thoughts and observations. Talking through your experiences helps you to better understand those experiences. Focus on the positive and continually strive to find the positive in every day's experiences.
Focus and build on strengths. As you realize the greatest progress, find the causes and replicate them. You'll make much faster progress building on strengths than you will trying to correct perceived weaknesses. If you find that assuming leadership roles is working well for you, then take on another one or expand the ones you have. This will provide momentum for improvement in other areas as well.
Make changes consistent with your direction and progress. We've discussed lifelong friends, transient friends, and new friends—make changes here consistent with your journey's direction. Your relationships, whether intimate or merely casual, should be consistent with your goals and not antithetical to them. The same would be true of your interests, hobbies, memberships, and so forth.
Your journey is both strategic and tactical. Your direction—who you want to become, and the nature and direction of your life—is the strategic nature of your journey. Your decisions on the journey about the factors and challenges we've discussed throughout the book are tactical. Thus, your daily decisions are to execute your overarching strategy. Your decisions on the road have to be in support of the destination you've chosen, not the other way around.
Ask “What's in it for me?” It's fine—in fact, vital—to be “healthily selfish.” You won't make progress on your journey by consistently sacrificing for others. Counterintuitively, you can best help others by helping yourself. The better you feel about yourself the more confident you'll be. Once you achieve that state you can intelligently help others in win/win and not win/lose relationships. If you keep moving over for others you'll forever be in the slow lane on your journey.
Keep raising the bar. This is a journey, not an event. As you make progress and become more successful, the bar should be raised, and you're the one to raise it. Don't be content with beating the same standard over and over—that's not how world records are set. Keep raising the bar. The current high-jump and pole-vault heights were unthinkable 10 years ago, as are the ones that will exist 10 years from now.
Understand at all times that what is today is not what is. We often fall in to the trap of thinking that today is the be-all and end-all of life. It is not; it's simply another way station along the journey. A patent official infamously announced in the late nineteenth century that the patent office ought to be closed because everything that could be invented had been invented. What's new today will be old tomorrow. The only constant is change.
Testing Yourself
Here are our questions for you to ask yourself to create self-mastery, following the chronology of the book. We suggest you insert them into your daily calendar and ask yourself on a daily basis about your progress (or lack thereof). These would also provide a fine structure to any journaling you choose to do per our advice above. They are keyed to each chapter, and may be used after reading the book as a “field guide” and/or while reading the book as an aid in immediate application.
Chapter 1: Misguided Aspirations
Why we tend to create the wrong goals and the wrong metrics
What have I been told I should be or become?
_____________________________________
Who do I really wish to become?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What is the actual internal control (shown in Figure 9.1) that I can exert daily for myself?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
Here's a brief test on your personal metrics and norms: Choose someone you consider to be a personal hero. It could be someone from a life experience, such as a teacher, or someone in the news, such as Sully Sullenberger (who landed his powerless plane in the Hudson with no loss of life):
_____________________________________
Write the personal traits of that person, as you define them, on the lines below. Try to think of at least seven. These could be patience, or boldness, or great use of language, and so forth: _____________________________________
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
Now, return to the top, cross off your hero's name, and write yours in.
List below which of these traits you already possess and which must be developed: __ Possess
__ Need to develop:______________________
__ Possess
__ Need to develop:______________________
__ Possess
__ Need to develop:______________________
__ Possess
__ Need to develop:______________________
__ Possess
__ Need to develop:______________________
__ Possess
__ Need to develop:______________________
__ Possess
__ Need to develop:______________________
What can you extricate yourself from that today captures you in a frenetic “spinning wheel” of activity but not fulfillment (e.g., social media)?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What detours threaten your journey, and how can you ignore or bypass them?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What are your major sources for standards, beliefs, and aspirations?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
Figure 9.1 Internal versus External Control
2. The Mythology of Friends for Life
The impermanence of permanence
What normative pressures do you feel the most?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What can you do to change or eliminate them?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
Who are your valued, lifelong friends?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
Are there friends who have become negative and dysfunctional? Who are they?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What friends, by name or by type, would you like to acquire during your journey?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
Whom do you live through (if anyone) vicariously?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What level are you on among the watertight doors (shown in Figure 9.2)?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What can you do to attain the next level and/or firmly seal the doors behind you?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What do you most have to let go of in order to reach out in bolder and more satisfying ways?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What do you need to more broadly generalize and give yourself credit for instead of calling your accomplishment “luck” or a one-time success?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What is your most serious example of scarcity thinking or poverty mentality and how will you change it?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
Where are you on the self-esteem chart (see Figure 9.3), and how will you migrate to the upper left and/or sustain yourself in the upper left?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
Figure 9.2 Watertight Doors
Figure 9.3 Esteem and Abundance
Behavioral Metamorphosis
If you're not careful, the butterfly may be no more beautiful than the caterpillar
What usually takes more time or money than you originally estimated?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What's the main reason for your answers?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
When and why have you been successful in stopping bad habits cold turkey without requiring help?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What behaviors do you seek to change?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What behaviors will you substitute?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What assistance will you need?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What metrics will show that you're making progress?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What will you do to sustain the change?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What beliefs do you currently hold that ought to be examined for their validity in shaping your attitudes and behavior?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What is your immediate reaction to unpleasant news or poor behavior on someone else's part?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
Would you make any changes to these immediate reactions and in what way?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
How much permission do you usually allow yourself (see Figure 9.4)?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
How can you best improve and sustain the proper permissions as you improve your behaviors and continue on your journey?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
Figure 9.4 The Permission Gauge
4. Believe It or Not
Do you believe me or your lying eyes?
When and where, if ever, do you feel like a fraud or imposter and why?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
Are you fearful of being arrogant or called arrogant? On what occasions?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
How would you describe the “real you”?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
The family dinner has all but disappeared. Extracurricular activities, dual-working parents, electronic games and diversions, sports, and a myriad of other distractions have ended nightly discussions over a meal. We were poor, but I nonetheless listened to my parents try to decide how to pay the bills, whether or not to seek new work, and how to handle difficult family members. I was also able to hear from them about my school challenges, other kids cheating in class, and unfair treatment.
The individual role models we provide are more crucial and far reaching than ever before.
Thus, we do have to acknowledge that there is a need to create models and examples, avatars of conduct. That's what we mean by legacy being written every day and not simply at the end of one's life or involvement with others.
The decisions and behaviors you choose to engage in every day are the woof and warp of your legacy. Just as there are athletes, entertainers, politicians, researchers, business leaders, and others whose legacy we can appreciate daily, there are people in our lives doing the same thing, though we may not realize it as such. Consequently, we are (or are not) providing similar episodes in our legacy daily for others around us.
If history holds true, some of you reading this book will contact us and let us know of the change it made in your lives. Some of you will recommend it to others. We write our books with that clearly in mind. We don't recommend fads, or simply emulate others' works, or experiment in our pages. Our responsibility is to help you to improve your lives by carefully adding to our own legacy.
That's not selfish, that's a contribution!
What contributions are you making? The Kantian categorical imperative applies to positive behaviors as well. We've witnessed pay-it-forward and gift-it-forward movements on social media, as well as viral appeals for charitable giving (e.g., the ice bucket challenge). What if everyone did what you did in terms of being generous, providing help, donating time and money, spending time with your family, admitting mistakes and apologizing, maintaining your health?
In Japanese society, there is chaos in the subways, with professional pushers helping to pack the cars inhumanly full. Yet on their bullet trains, the cars stop perfectly at particular spots on the platform and people board in an orderly fashion with no problem or inconvenience. Even within one culture, we can find significant examples of differences in conduct.
So we ask you here perhaps the most important question in the book: What are you doing now, today, to build your legacy while on your evolutionary journey? It will seldom be one grand gesture, and will more probably be a continuing series of positive actions that not only help you and help others but provide a lasting guide for others to use along their own journeys.
Lifestorming is about taking on life and enjoying it immensely by contributing to it enormously. We hope we've enhanced your journey by sharing lessons of our own.
Notes
1. One of my favorite stories is about her stopping to play one of the ubiquitous pianos in a Ritz-Carlton hotel. A security guy came over and told her that she couldn't play the piano. “Apparently, I can,” she replied, continuing with her music.
2. YouTube is probably the largest of the social media platforms; it has somewhat more depth because it is visual, but it is also one of the sites with the most obscene and profane communications.
9
Self-Mastery: The Lifestorming Field Guide to Your Successful Journey
Over decades of coaching others, we've found that there is a discernible, practical difference between those who make little headway after learning new techniques and those who absolutely rocket forward past others, having found new fuel and vigor. We've included this chapter as our admonition to be among the latter, including our best practices as to how to do it.
If you truly wish to apply our principles of Lifestorming to your own journey—and you're on a journey whether or not you've acknowledged it, despite its direction, speed, or progress—then these are the distinguishing features of those who are most successful in that pursuit.
Apply the learning immediately, right now, without any waiting. You can't wait for “the right time” or “the proper situation.” You must proactively seek an immediate use. For example, if you wish to focus on building aspects of character, choose the trait most important and find resources to help you improve right now. If you want to examine the relevance of your beliefs and values, write them down and ask if they represent your current thinking. If you want to change and/or enlarge friendships, describe the people you'd like to have for friends and find a way to meet them.
Share your intent. An important aspect of creating accountability is to include others in your plans so that they can inquire about progress (as well as help you with it). We mentioned earlier that people who have overweight waiters tend to order more food, and those who watch others exercise tend to exercise harder themselves. Find people who have made significant changes, who are on their own journeys, and become accountable to them as well.
Pursue success, not perfection. Don't allow a setback to overturn the entire cart. Not everything will work perfectly, you'll have some nonsuccess, and you'll get frustrated (“I'm still self-editing too much.”). That's okay. Acknowledge now that the journey has obstacles and can be slower going at times; just don't allow them to lead you to the off ramp. Be resilient, and use setbacks as learning opportunities that support future successes.
Journal and record. In the mornings, take a minute to tell yourself what you're going to accomplish, and in the evenings tell yourself what you have accomplished. Use a hard copy, electronic, or audio journal to record your thoughts and observations. Talking through your experiences helps you to better understand those experiences. Focus on the positive and continually strive to find the positive in every day's experiences.
Focus and build on strengths. As you realize the greatest progress, find the causes and replicate them. You'll make much faster progress building on strengths than you will trying to correct perceived weaknesses. If you find that assuming leadership roles is working well for you, then take on another one or expand the ones you have. This will provide momentum for improvement in other areas as well.
Make changes consistent with your direction and progress. We've discussed lifelong friends, transient friends, and new friends—make changes here consistent with your journey's direction. Your relationships, whether intimate or merely casual, should be consistent with your goals and not antithetical to them. The same would be true of your interests, hobbies, memberships, and so forth.
Your journey is both strategic and tactical. Your direction—who you want to become, and the nature and direction of your life—is the strategic nature of your journey. Your decisions on the journey about the factors and challenges we've discussed throughout the book are tactical. Thus, your daily decisions are to execute your overarching strategy. Your decisions on the road have to be in support of the destination you've chosen, not the other way around.
Ask “What's in it for me?” It's fine—in fact, vital—to be “healthily selfish.” You won't make progress on your journey by consistently sacrificing for others. Counterintuitively, you can best help others by helping yourself. The better you feel about yourself the more confident you'll be. Once you achieve that state you can intelligently help others in win/win and not win/lose relationships. If you keep moving over for others you'll forever be in the slow lane on your journey.
Keep raising the bar. This is a journey, not an event. As you make progress and become more successful, the bar should be raised, and you're the one to raise it. Don't be content with beating the same standard over and over—that's not how world records are set. Keep raising the bar. The current high-jump and pole-vault heights were unthinkable 10 years ago, as are the ones that will exist 10 years from now.
Understand at all times that what is today is not what is. We often fall in to the trap of thinking that today is the be-all and end-all of life. It is not; it's simply another way station along the journey. A patent official infamously announced in the late nineteenth century that the patent office ought to be closed because everything that could be invented had been invented. What's new today will be old tomorrow. The only constant is change.
Testing Yourself
Here are our questions for you to ask yourself to create self-mastery, following the chronology of the book. We suggest you insert them into your daily calendar and ask yourself on a daily basis about your progress (or lack thereof). These would also provide a fine structure to any journaling you choose to do per our advice above. They are keyed to each chapter, and may be used after reading the book as a “field guide” and/or while reading the book as an aid in immediate application.
Chapter 1: Misguided Aspirations
Why we tend to create the wrong goals and the wrong metrics
What have I been told I should be or become?
_____________________________________
Who do I really wish to become?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What is the actual internal control (shown in Figure 9.1) that I can exert daily for myself?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
Here's a brief test on your personal metrics and norms: Choose someone you consider to be a personal hero. It could be someone from a life experience, such as a teacher, or someone in the news, such as Sully Sullenberger (who landed his powerless plane in the Hudson with no loss of life):
_____________________________________
Write the personal traits of that person, as you define them, on the lines below. Try to think of at least seven. These could be patience, or boldness, or great use of language, and so forth: _____________________________________
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
Now, return to the top, cross off your hero's name, and write yours in.
List below which of these traits you already possess and which must be developed: __ Possess
__ Need to develop:______________________
__ Possess
__ Need to develop:______________________
__ Possess
__ Need to develop:______________________
__ Possess
__ Need to develop:______________________
__ Possess
__ Need to develop:______________________
__ Possess
__ Need to develop:______________________
__ Possess
__ Need to develop:______________________
What can you extricate yourself from that today captures you in a frenetic “spinning wheel” of activity but not fulfillment (e.g., social media)?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What detours threaten your journey, and how can you ignore or bypass them?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What are your major sources for standards, beliefs, and aspirations?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
Figure 9.1 Internal versus External Control
2. The Mythology of Friends for Life
The impermanence of permanence
What normative pressures do you feel the most?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What can you do to change or eliminate them?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
Who are your valued, lifelong friends?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
Are there friends who have become negative and dysfunctional? Who are they?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What friends, by name or by type, would you like to acquire during your journey?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
Whom do you live through (if anyone) vicariously?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What level are you on among the watertight doors (shown in Figure 9.2)?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What can you do to attain the next level and/or firmly seal the doors behind you?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What do you most have to let go of in order to reach out in bolder and more satisfying ways?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What do you need to more broadly generalize and give yourself credit for instead of calling your accomplishment “luck” or a one-time success?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What is your most serious example of scarcity thinking or poverty mentality and how will you change it?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
Where are you on the self-esteem chart (see Figure 9.3), and how will you migrate to the upper left and/or sustain yourself in the upper left?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
Figure 9.2 Watertight Doors
Figure 9.3 Esteem and Abundance
Behavioral Metamorphosis
If you're not careful, the butterfly may be no more beautiful than the caterpillar
What usually takes more time or money than you originally estimated?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What's the main reason for your answers?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
When and why have you been successful in stopping bad habits cold turkey without requiring help?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What behaviors do you seek to change?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What behaviors will you substitute?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What assistance will you need?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What metrics will show that you're making progress?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What will you do to sustain the change?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What beliefs do you currently hold that ought to be examined for their validity in shaping your attitudes and behavior?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
What is your immediate reaction to unpleasant news or poor behavior on someone else's part?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
Would you make any changes to these immediate reactions and in what way?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
How much permission do you usually allow yourself (see Figure 9.4)?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
How can you best improve and sustain the proper permissions as you improve your behaviors and continue on your journey?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
Figure 9.4 The Permission Gauge
4. Believe It or Not
Do you believe me or your lying eyes?
When and where, if ever, do you feel like a fraud or imposter and why?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
Are you fearful of being arrogant or called arrogant? On what occasions?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
How would you describe the “real you”?
_____________________________________
_____________________________________
