Ordinary Life, Extraordinary Living

Yes, It Can Be Easy

Several people have told me they really liked my holiday e-card this year. In case you missed it, here it is. 

The story that I like to tell is that it was easy to do. Yes, easy. Here's how it happened.

Early December, Andrea Lee, who I interacted with briefly at the International Coach Federation conference, emailed me about being interviewed on her blog. At the end of her note, she offered to support me in any way she could. I wrote back that I could use a recommendation for a graphic designer to help me with a holiday e-card.  Andrea immediately recommended  Sarah Van Male at Cyanotype Book Architects. They do book covers for a living but fortunately for me, they're flexible with what else they do with their talents. And even better, when I emailed Sarah, she said they could fit me into their December schedule. 

Now that I had a graphic designer, I just needed the words.  I have my new friend, Wendy Gutin, to thank for that. About the same time, Wendy emailed a lovely note, in which she ended by saying that she counts having met me as one of her blessings this past year. Mix in a bit of thought during my yoga practice on the topic of counting blessings and the words for the card emerged clearly. Within a week of asking Andrea for a recommendation, I had the holiday e-card ready for sending out.

My intention for 2007 is that every part of my life has this same ease to it.

Reflections on the Year

Here's a great exercise for looking back on the year from my coach, Shirley Anderson:

At year’s end, I generally ask my clients to list 25 things they are most proud of accomplishing in the past year.  And also, what do they regret or wish had turned out differently. I think you’ll find it totally worthwhile and very heart-warming.

I tried a version of this with two clients last week and it was a nice way to end the year.  Instead of the client listing 25 things, we traded off things that we were grateful for in the last year, until the client and I both had listed 10 things. You could easily do this with a spouse or friend. I found I had few regrets and many blessings.

BTW--Shirley is the founder of the long-running Coaching Salon. If you aren't familiar with it, check it out.  It's a great venue for learning and wisdom, independent of what you do for a living.

Moles in the Snow

If you hadn't heard, Denver got socked with a heck of a snowstorm.  Judging from the many hours that my husband spent outside shoveling snow off the driveway, I think it's one of the bigger storms since we moved here over 15 years ago--well over 2 feet in 24 hours.

Here's a picture of my son, Andy, with his two friends, digging snow tunnels in the front yard.  Kids can be industrious (even more so than adults) when it's mixed in with lots of fun.  That's what was happening here. Enjoy.

Leader as Storyteller

I interviewed Steve Denning, known as one of the founders of the movement to use storytelling in organizations, for my podcast, Leading With A Whole New Mind. Steve has written several books on using stories in a purposeful way to achieve business objectives. His latest book, The Leader's Guide to Storytelling: Mastering the Art and Discipline of Business Narrative, details seven different templates for telling a story, based on a specific purpose. In other words, Steve has used left-brain logical thinking to analyze a right brain activity, storytelling. Brilliant!

We had a fascinating conversation that includes the story of how Steve went from becoming a World Bank manager in charge of making loans in Africa to becoming a guru on business narrative. Look for the interview to be posted next month.

One of the most interesting points that Steve made is this: Organizations are becoming hip to the power of story to enable change in organizations. Leaders are being trained on the art and discipline of storytelling and being evaluated by their skill in telling effective stories.  In other words, storytelling is becoming a leadership competency.

Story is Leadership 101.  Now that's a great tale to tell.

Traveling into Other Worlds

My sister called me this morning to invite me to dim sum. Think of dim sum as the Chinese version of brunch time tapas. Small appetizers brought on carts roaming a large room of tables, usually occupied by individuals with extended families and/or lots of friends.  It's good to go with a group of people so you can try many dishes. Dumplings filled with shrimp and roast pork and beef, spicy short ribs, sticky rice wrapped in fragrant leaves, and pastries filled with egg custard. Add another 50 or so appetizers and it becomes a feeding frenzy.  Watch your fingers.

Through an online search, my brother-in-law had supposedly found the best dim sum place in Denver, King's Land Seafood Restaurant. I know, that's not saying a whole lot.  More importantly, according to my sister's palate, this dim sum was as good as what she could find in Hong Kong, where she had lived for several years before moving to Colorado.

If you live in a place where you can get dim sum (NY, San Francisco, LA, Chicago and lots of smaller cities with an Asian population), try it out on a Sunday morning. It's the best way to transport yourself to another world, and get a great meal at the same time. 

Afterwards, we visited a Asian supermarket. That's where I really felt the impact of stepping into another world. It had all the areas that you expect in a grocery store--meats, produce, canned goods, candy and snacks--but with none of the familiar brands or foods.  How exactly does one cook salmon heads or chicken feet?  The smallest bags of rice come in sacks of 25 lbs. My brother-in-law chided me for looking for the 5 lb. bags that I usually see at the Safeway.

Which brings me to my biggest insight for today. I am less Chinese and more American than I realized.  My roots go deep in being born Chinese and raised Chinese. And over the years, my world has become that of mainstream America. Shopping at Target and eating at the local pizza place will do that to you. We live in a rich, diverse place and I hope to see more of it by exploring my own roots. Thanks, Sis.

Assume There Is...

While interviewing Tama Kieves for my Leading With A Whole New Mind podcast, we talked about what it looks like for her to be a boundary crosser, a term used in the book to indicate someone who is comfortable in many worlds.  She said something profound (which Tama is known to do often!)

"While others assume no connection [between two worlds], I always assume there is a connection. I just have to find it."  While she was practicing law, this meant taking a concept from one legal situation and applying it to a completely different legal situation. Now, as a career coach, author, and speaker, she uses this "assume a connection" mindset to address many different audiences.

This got me thinking. I was coaching a client on being in situations where he didn't feel he had control.  What if instead of assuming no control, assume there is control?  What would his life be like then?   As it happened, my client told me about a specific incident where a work decision had been made that on the surface, didn't seem to involve his input. Upon later investigation, he realized that a previous discussion with his manager had driven the entire decision. In other words, he had more control than he thought.

Assume connections, even if you don't see one.

Assume you have control, even if you don't feel like you have it. 

Stories With Meaning

An article in the Wall Street Journal reported a new type of speaker for corporate retreats.  In the past, companies hired management gurus like Peter Drucker or Tom Peters or Jim Collins to speak.  Now they are hiring speakers at rates fit for a Drucker or Peters or Collins, who may have no business experience at all.

Who are these speakers?  People who have unique life stories to tell of overcoming adversity—a blind mountaineer, the Central Park jogger who was assaulted and left for dead, a part-time rancher who survived the crush of a large bale of hay. And the corporate crowds are being wowed by these speakers—inspired and moved to tears.

What I’m struck by is how humans are compelled by stories with meaning.  It is an easy next step to apply those stories to our own lives—how we can be more courageous, more tenacious, more innovative in the face of business challenges.  In fact, in the article, a Cisco manager is quoted as saying after the blind mountaineer spoke, “With all the chaos of the past five years, it’s as if we’ve all been climbing blind. But that’s no reason to be timid.  Be pioneers. Climb high.” 

I think stories with meaning are all around us, that we don’t have to wait until our employers decide to plunk down $10K for a motivational speaker. Look for the stories that are waiting to be told. They are in your colleagues, your neighbors, your family and friends. There are more heroes and heroines among us than we realize.

The Hokey Pokey

Last week, my colleague, Deb Siverson, and I worked with a corporate team. Team members met face-to-face for the first time and came from all over the world—Germany, Singapore, the UK as well as the US. More than half of the team was born outside of the US.   

This was my first experience working with such a diverse team in terms of language and culture.  Deb and I soon discovered that we would need to adapt our work with the group to account for the language barriers and cultural differences.  Story-telling, a main ingredient of one part of the workshop, just didn’t translate when peppered with slang. 

We started to use the body—asking that stories be told with physical gestures and movement.  The team members responded beautifully, even as one or two needed encouragement and prompting.  We knew we were on the right track when faces lit up with a new understanding of what was being communicated. 

At the end of the day, we decided that instead of the usual “give me your takeaway from today,” we needed a different way to close the workshop. We were running out of time and had a plane to catch, so it also had to be quick.  Asking for words would take too long and bog us down with the language barrier.  Instead, Deb suggested “thirty seconds of crazy fun.”  I was afraid that Deb was going to look to me for ideas.  I had just said that playing and fun were strengths of mine. But “crazy fun” in 30 seconds seemed daunting. The team members thought that as well. 

In a moment of inspiration, Deb yelled out, “Let’s do the Hokey Pokey!”  The Germans looked at us with a blank stare.  As soon as Deb said it, I knew it would work.  Even if half of the group had no idea what the Hokey Pokey was. So we started. By the time we got to “you put your left foot in,” the group was beaming and following along like it was a long lost childhood ritual. It served the purpose of closing out the day on a high note, where everyone could participate and be in the energy of a perfectly aligned group.

Sometimes, all we need is a stirring round of the Hokey Pokey. 

Mourning

My sister-in-law sent me an article entitled, "blessed mourning," knowing that I was experiencing grief over the loss of my friend, Ilene. It talks about how mourning has fallen out of fashion, that in earlier times, there was a formal mourning period, when black was worn and people did not attend social functions.  This rigid behavior served a practical purpose.  Quote:

"[Such practices] shielded mourners from the demands of daily interactions and distractions, thus giving their hearts and minds sufficient time to heal."

The recognition that grief is a sacred time and cannot be hurried is refreshing. The team putting together the next program for the Conscious Living, Conscious Leaving podcast has found it difficult to get back into the groove of the work. Hearing Ilene's voice on tape, I'm profoundly grateful that these tapes exist. And I'm keenly aware that grief must have its due time. 

Tag

I'm trying to move the mindset of 45-year old into the space of a child's game--tag.  I've been "tagged" by fellow blogger, Debbie Call, to answer the following question:

What are five things that most people don't know about me?

• I have several childhood nicknames that my siblings still continue to use with me. One of those nicknames is one my sister and I use with each other, Bertha. Actually the full nickname is Bertha Butt. It was born out of an exchange I overheard when I was volunteering as a high school kid at a center for mildly retarded people. I know that's probably not PC these days, so someone help me with the name for people with lower than normal IQs.  A resident went up to one of the football jocks who was also volunteering and said squarely in his face, "How are you doing, Bertha Butt?" and then walked away.  The football jock was speechless. Even then, I collected stories and this one made the rounds of my family. The name Bertha has stuck with me ever since.

• I have earned the title, Hoagie Queen. In college, I organized a sorority fundraiser centered around making hoagies (think Subway without the freshness and variety) and selling them during Superbowl half-time. My sorority sisters and I left the warm confines of our living area, in January, in Chicago, to carry bags of cellophane-wrapped hoagies to dorms, in search of customers. Even the coolest of my sorority sisters were relegated to being an overstuffed bag lady. What made it even worse was that most students had already arranged their own parties, pizza deliveries, and the like to coincide with half-time. (BTW--back then, people actually got up during half-time because commercials were just commercials, not major productions). Very few hoagies were sold. Which meant my sorority sisters and I toted our bags home, nearly full, and had more hoagies than we knew what to do with.  I remember standing up the next week at a formal meeting of my sisters, and as the treasurer for the house, reporting that we had made all of $51.02.  Friends joked for the rest of the year that hoagies could be found underneath my bed.  Thus, the name, Hoagie Queen.

• I have a checkered career as a flutist.  Actually, it started out just fine in my school years, up through the first year of college.  In high school, I played in orchestras, concert bands, marching bands, jazz bands, and any city and state youth groups I could qualify for. I went to music camp in the summer. Until one day, at Northwestern, the band director turned to me and asked me to play a note. He asked if I was sharp or flat.  I guessed right.  But I quit playing in groups after that semester, citing the heavy workload of taking organic chemistry and calculus and physics. I played again when I was in my twenties, in a band at Bell Labs. We practiced during lunch. During that decade, I was asked to perform at a family member's wedding, with too little rehearsal time and an unfamiliar piece of music.  I ended the piece six measures ahead of the piano accompaniment, making me lose my taste for playing for another ten years.   And now in my forties, I play in a community band near my home. No one asks me if I'm flat or sharp. No one minds if I come in at the wrong place. For the first time, I truly enjoy playing with others without worrying about performing.

The tag game says to write about five things. I'm afraid if I keep going, I'd be asking my readers to indulge me in ever increasing dribble about embarrassing moments in my life. Somehow, the other stuff that people don't know about me is just not that interesting. So I'll end it here.

Now that I've been "it", the game continues. I'm tagging Deb Cooperman, William Arruda, Andrea Lee, and Hanna Cooper.

By the way, whoever created this game is a genius. Not only does this make visible our connections to other bloggers, but it generates traffic and interest for everyone all the way around. Brilliant!