Midlife Awakening

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The world will conspire to help you

Get your mission clear!

What do you want to accomplish?

What do you value?

For me, I have often found myself thinking or saying:  “Leave it better than you found it.”  I have said this often to get myself through some very challenging experiences, so I would consider it a key value for me.

Even in trivial matters, you will see opportunities to follow your mission once you get clarity for yourself.

Here is one such trivial matter as an example:  This morning, I went for a jog.  I am traveling for work.  I know the area because I travel here often, but as an occasional visitor, I have no personal stake in the area.  As I am running, I notice a plastic bag from the grocery store stuck in one of the bushes next to the sidewalk.  Nothing was in the bag, and it must have been blown into the bush by the wind.  It looked clean enough, so I picked it up.  As I continued my jog, I came across an empty beer can on the sidewalk.  I picked up the empty can and put it in the bag I found.  Then I noticed a candy wrapper, some old papers and scraps, and a popped balloon and a soda can.

By the time I finished my jog, I had filled the grocery bag with trash.  As I am heading to my hotel, I passed a garbage can next to a business, and dropped the bag in the trash can.

I left that small area of my jog better than I found it.  I did not prepare to do it, and it cost me nothing.  The world literally provided everything I needed to act at just the time I needed it to honor my values.

I think the same kinds of things happen in many areas of life.  In order to receive the help we need from the world and from “luck”, we have to be clear on our mission and looking for the opportunities when they appear.  Recognizing the opportunity is very important, but none of that matters if you do not take action with the resources provided to you in the moment.

Take aways:

  • Get clear on what your mission is!
  • Look for opportunities around you all the time
  • Take action immediately and seize that opportunity when it appears.

 

Our focus defines us

Over the last couple days, I decided that I have been a little too entrenched in my own thoughts and planning, that I was not in touch with current stories in the news.  Basically, I was feeling a bit detached from the world, and thought punching in to some talk radio and browsing some basic news sites while running a few errands would help me feel a bit more connected.  Here is what I heard while listening in, paraphrased and summarized of course:

  • Gorilla was murdered.  “That gorilla was not trying to hurt that little boy” (one source)
  • Never Trump.  “I am conservative.  I cannot support Trump for president” (one example source)
  • JJ Watt.  “Is J.J. a male model or a football player?” the coach texted back. “What does he want to do? Be in movies or be the best football player possible?” (source)

I may have to keep my radio and news sources turned off to make sure I do not get sucked into this nonsense, but since I am already in the muck, I will make some observations that I hope you will be useful or at least entertaining.

While none of these topics are directly related in the news, they indicate how pervasive the negative mindset has become across our country, and how acceptable it has become.

Take a minute to read the examples below:

Gorilla was murdered – Remember the little boy who fell into the gorilla cage at the zoo?  It is terrible that the gorilla died because of this, but a child was at risk.  A gorilla is about 10 times stronger than the strongest person you have ever met, and does not have human sensibilities.  Without trying, the gorilla could easily have injured or killed the boy. If they had used a tranquilizer and the gorilla killed the boy, what would the news people be saying then?  What if you were in the cage with the gorilla…would you want to hang out for 5 minutes hoping he would go to sleep soon after being shot in the butt with a dart?

Never Trump – So, you are conservative, and believe that making Hilary Clinton the next president is a truer representation of your values than supporting Trump for president… really?  8 years of Hilary appointing Supreme Court Justices who serve for life, and you think that is better for your conservative positions…really?

JJ Watt – A coach was quoted who was critical of all the TV shows JJ Watt has been doing lately and saying it was taking away from his focus on football.  You are a coach who thinks that this guy is slacking off in football…wow.  Look at his stats, look at his training schedule, and next go shut the hell up…JJ changed the nature of his position in football forever by working his butt off and showing complete engagement every time he plays.  He also seems to be a likable fellow who is having fun with some of his fame, and doing a lot of charity work along the way.  It is sad that we do not know how to react to an NFL player who is apparently not abusing people or drugs.  I say rock on JJ, and keep doing what you are doing.  A lot of us wish you the best and hope you keep milking life for all it is worth.  Oh…and when its time to hang up the cleats, I bet JJ does it with some grace instead of becoming a drug addict or falling out of the bottom of the NFL, because he has a winning mindset.

What I take away from those examples:

I understand being angered by things that happen, being dissatisfied with our available choices, and jealous of others who are living their life the best way they know how. It is how we respond to these things that determines if we are going to improve, stagnate, or descend into pettiness or despair.

Most of these things will not have a major effect on any of our lives by the way, so that is the real issue.  We spend all this energy getting amped up about these things, and most of us will never experience any of these things directly, or even be affected much by the outcome.  Consider these three points:

  • 99% of us will never be face to face with a gorilla without a cage separating us, and most of us know almost nothing about gorillas, so why would we hold an opinion so strongly when we have no knowledge of the topic and judge the mom, the zoo, and even the gorilla?
  • Regardless of who becomes the next president, it will not ruin your life, nor will it fix your life.  Fixing your life is your responsibility.
  • When we see an exceptionally talented person who strives to improve themselves and also tries to experience new things and grow or have fun, many people come up with a reason to criticize that person.  Mediocrity loves company.

Exceptional people are a reminder that if we passionately follow our dreams and work every day, we can bend our lives into a shape that we choose.  Critics and wanna-bees  just want to waste our time and keep us down with them, making excuses about why things are not working out.

I propose the following:

  • Identify the areas in your life where you are struggling, or that you want to improve, and write those things down in a journal.
  • For each of these items, write down 3 actions you can take today that might help improve those problems.
  • Circle or highlight those tasks that support more than one of the areas you want to improve
  • Enter tasks on your smart phone or calendar to prompt you to do those things every day.
  • Make this plan a priority, even if it means you have to wake up earlier to do it, or have to eat a lunch you packed at home to save some some time (Packing your lunch will save you time, money, and usually be healthier for you than anything you would eat at a restaurant, so this is one of those items you could highlight because it supports multiple areas of improvement).
  • Follow this plan for a week and write down how you feel at the end of the week.  I suspect you will feel a lot better, so while you are high with some success, plan your next week so you are ready to roll the next week.
  • Lather, rinse, repeat for a month and see if you are improving your life yet.

Why do employers have a policy prohibiting sharing of compensation information?

I remember early in my career, when I made it a point to read all the paperwork and make note of the various things that were in the policy handbook.  For some reason, I found it interesting.  Maybe because I figured out early on that if there was a sign telling you to do something or not to do something, or a policy written about something, those things were written to avoid some problem.  As a case in point, before McDonalds was sued when a coffee spilled in someone’s lap, there were no signs warning you that the coffee was very hot…now those signs are in every drive through window.

As it turns out, employers have policies to discourage you sharing your salary information with co-workers to avoid distractions and negative feelings in the workplace.  I can see the point of this, but in my experience, many people violate such policies quite regularly.  Personally, I do not talk about my pay with coworkers, but that is probably because I never quite feel like one of the in crowd….more like an alien in the workplace.

There are two tendencies that people have that help to justify the employer’s policy about compensation information.  These are self-justification, and fairness.  Self-justification means that people will reconcile their own behavior (good and bad), exaggerate their description of those behaviors in others within their social groups, and go full tilt describing those behaviors in people they are not associated with.  Consider what happens when describing how a person describes following the speed limit laws:  “I keep up with the flow of traffic”, while “you speed all the time”, and “that guy is a maniac!”  To tie this back to our topic, consider this:  Most people think they do work that is superior to their coworkers.

The other tendency that people have is to instinctively recognize unfairness, and experience very raw emotions when witnessing unfairness.  As it turns out, this is not just a tendency of people, but of primates and probably most animals!  For a great demonstration of this, check out Frans de Waal’s TED talk about Equal Pay for Monkeys on YouTube.

Based on these two tendencies, its easy to see why an employer would discourage talk about compensation between their employees.

The employer might defend their policy by emphasizing that unfairness might not truly exist in organization, but the perception of unfairness by a misguided employee could trigger a nasty reaction and disrupt the workplace.  In the context of self-justification, most people think they do work that is superior to their coworkers, but not everyone who believes this can be correct!  From the perspective of the employer, it is best not to talk about these things, except during the review process with your supervisor.

There is the possibility that the pay scale is actually unfair, where equal work is actually earning unequal pay.  In this scenario, it is also in the best interest of the employer to prevent discussion of these things among their employees.  Of course the motivation is completely different in this case…if the employer had to correct actual unfairness in pay scales, they would likely have to give raises to all the underpaid staff, and that would cost a lot of money.  Plus, it would call into question the trustworthiness of the employer in the eyes of some of their employees.  Many employees are not motivated primarily by money, so the call out on the trust problem of an employer could lead to reduced motivation by these low-paid treasures of employees, or even worse, their departure from the company for greener pastures, with a more trusted and noble employer.

There you have my explanation, so please make sure you do not share any of this article with your friends or co-workers!