Escaping Mediocrity

A guest post by Sally G.

This post has a theme song.

People Are Strange by Echo and the Bunnymen: http://tinysong.com/sECk

I gave myself a new title yesterday – Spirit Sleuth. From this point onward, I will observe everything around me as a Detective who is trying to solve a case. Everything that happens will hold within it a clue. Everyone who crosses my path will have something to do with the truth that I search. Nice to know that my English Major background will finally be put to good use!

When I brought in the mail, I was excited to see my woman’s magazine had been delivered. I always look forward to reading through it at night with a hot cup of tea – my reward for a day that I’ve at last put behind me. I then decided to see it as a Spirit Sleuth would see it ~ what message for me lay somewhere on its cover?

Strong, Sexy, Stylish leaped off the page. It was in reference to the actress featured inside the issue – but it got me to thinking: if someone were to run a feature story about me, what three adjectives would they deem appropriate to scream from the page? And more importantly, what three adjectives would I desire to sum me up succinctly in a nano-second?

Dull, Forgettable, Strange. Hmmmm, not very flattering – and it would be the last time anyone ever featured me in their magazine, that’s for sure.

Who spends money to read about Dull, Forgettable and Strange?

I’m going to make an executive decision here and forget about how others might define me. After all, that’s been my ‘problem’ all along, hasn’t it? Letting others define me and then living up to those expectations regardless of how well the adjectives fit?

I’m going to create myself as I’d like to be seen.

Spiritualists do that – they create themselves in the grandest version of the greatest vision that they can imagine. And I’ve decided that I am a Spiritualist – at least, I’m practicing to be one because I do believe it to be the most effective way to eventually replace my false Self with my authentic Self.

The vision I’ve been holding of me walking up to a closed door, opening it, throwing my arms around the Authentic Me that’s waiting there and crying, “Oh thank heavens I’ve finally found you – we can be one at last and the role playing will end forever!” isn’t really working for me. And I’m quite enjoying this idea of myself as a Spirit Sleuth – so, yes – I’m going to create three adjectives to describe me the way I would like to be seen, which is probably how I actually am, I just haven’t fully found the confidence to act on that yet.

Fascinating, Funny, Fluid

I probably didn’t have to use alliteration just because the magazine did – but I actually like this. If people knew what went on in this head of mine in the time it takes to blink, they might actually deem me fascinating. And I do have a different way of looking at the world – and I may also be the only person on the planet who has a fear of closed doors, so – Fascinating stays.

I also consider myself to be quite hilarious – I truly do crack myself up on quite a regular basis. Yes, not everyone seems to be on my wavelength and I do have a wit that requires you to pay attention to everything said up to my hilarious outburst because I do tend to play off what is being discussed and spin it into the humorous. But people who are capable of doing all that do tend to laugh too. And more than once people have looked at me differently and said, “Wow, you’re funny.” – like THAT was beyond imagining until just moments before. So, Funny stays too.

Besides, this ability I have to see a different spin on something being discussed really helps me with my present missive as a Spirit Sleuth – from what I can gather so far, you really have to look for what’s not there and in the looking for what’s not there, it suddenly becomes visible to the point that the entire event or exchange is completely about what was not even noticeable at first, leaving you to wonder how you ever missed it in the first place.

Which leads me to my final adjective: Fluid

If I do anything well, it’s going with the flow. I mean, I’m learning to do that well now – I wasn’t always fluid, I was more on the other end of the spectrum – very rigid. However, if you’re going to dedicate your days to looking for things that aren’t there and then affixing meaning to those things that only you see, and only you see them because only you are looking for them – then being rigid is only going to hold you back.

Fluidity, however, allows me to be involved in an interaction, oblivious to the clue it holds until I suddenly remember that I’m a Spirit Sleuth – and I then continue on as though I am still oblivious (because not to do so would probably completely freak out the other person or people in the exchange) but the whole time I’m really looking for the underlying meaning that could really change everything if I can find it, interpret it and then act upon it in kind.

It is not lost on me that this blog post could be entered as evidence in a future law suit launched to challenge my sanity.

Not that anyone would have any reason to do that – but if they did, I could see this working against me. Unless the lawyer was a Spirit Sleuth too. What are the odds of that though –- I’ve heard they don’t even have souls.

Spirit Sleuthing is definitely no place for the Mediocre. And it can be lonely at times. What do you say – will you join me in my work?

Sally G. is a self-professed work-in-progress who has chosen to keep the aspects of herself that work ~ releasing old habits, labels and tendencies that do not. Chanting the mantra “Self-Actualization ain’t no place for sissies” ~ she fully supports, encourages and inspires all the courageous travellers she meets along the way. Sally’s reflections, humour and insight are on full display on her blog site and on Twitter

This is going to be hard. I am a serious multi-tasker and I make a TON of phone calls in the car.  But I also know that cell phone use for calls and for texting while driving is creating serious safety issues.  Of course I just think it’s the other guy who’s the problem, not me.

That’s what we ALL think.

So today, I am going to be part of the solution. I’m joining Oprah’s No Phone Zone Movement that is launching today. My phone is going in the glove box when I get in the car so I’m not tempted to answer it or even check it while I am driving.

Need some statistics to convince you that our cell phones and driving don’t mix? Here you go:

• Every single time someone takes their eyes or their focus off the road – even for just a few seconds – they put their lives and the lives of others in danger.  Distracted driving is unsafe, irresponsible and in a split second, its consequences can be devastating. ~ U.S. Secretary of Transportation, Ray LaHood
• New research findings by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) that show nearly 6,000 people died in 2008 in crashes involving a distracted or inattentive driver, and more than half a million were injured.
• On any given day in 2008, more than 800,000 vehicles were driven by someone using a hand-held cell phone.
• Across the board, federal researchers who have directly observed drivers of all ages found that more and more people are using a variety of hand-held devices while driving – not just cell phones, but also iPods, video games, Blackberrys and GPS systems.
• In particular, cell phone use for talking and texting is now more prevalent on our nation’s roads, rail systems and waterways, carrying a dangerous potential for accidents.

For our safety and the safety of those we love, we’ve all got to be part of the solution. Here’s what you can do:

1. Put your cell phone in the glove box while you are driving. Get temptation out of reach!

2. Check out the No Phone Zone Causes Page = www.causes.com/nophonezone

3. Sign the No Phone Zone Pledge – http://apps.facebook.com/causes/petitions/455

Let’s help safety on the road escape mediocrity today, ok?!

Ok – it’s official. Getting rid of crap seems to be something everyone is interested in doing. (See Tuesday’s Crap Attack post for more info).  And if we are all interested in doing it but we aren’t actually engaged in doing it, perhaps we could use a little extra motivational push!

And here’s the thing. Not one of us can escape mediocrity if we are carting around loads of stuff. Even if it is stuffed into the basement, the fact that this stuff exists occupies bandwidth like a program running in the background of your computer.

So, I’ve decided to make the a Tribe Project/Challenge and I invite everyone to join in.

Here’s how it will work:

-I will regularly check in and update this post from now until Monday and share what I have gathered up and what has actually left my house.

-Other members of the tribe can do the same in the comments section.

-We also all need encouragement and cheering on when tackling projects like this so let’s root for each other as we make progress.

This is going to be fun!

I have entirely too much stuff.

There are lots of reasons for this state of affairs.

1) I am a child of a child of the depression so I learned not to throw anything away.

2) When my dad died, I inherited both his house packed to the brim with stuff as well as my grandmother’s house packed to the brim with stuff.

3) I like cool stuff. Especially if I think I might be able to use it/wear it someday.

But the situation has gotten out of control. I have clothes I haven’t worn in years (and am not likely to anytime in the near future. I have lamps, rugs and knick-knacks that don’t really suit my style. And I have more books than I will ever be able to read or re-read.

The weight of all of this stuff is starting to strangle me. And it keeps me from being nimble. I mean, how can I trap of mediocrity if I am trapped by stuff?

So, starting today – I am pitching out with a heavy hand.  Here are my criteria:

1) Do I love it?

2) Do I use it?

3) Do I want it?

4) Do I need it?

5) It is worth trading my lightness of foot for it?

Now in the interest is transparency, I’ve reached this place before. Sick to death of my stuff and vowing to get rid of it. But my attempts in the past have been measly really. And last night I hit on why that is.

For some reason giving stuff to the Salvation Army so that it can be re-sold just doesn’t do it for me. There are people in my city who don’t even have the cash or the wherewithall to shop there. And beside, I shop there – and I am not exactly in need. So collecting my donations have been half-hearted at best.

Then I remembered something. There is a place that people go, sometimes in the middle of the night, and arrive with nothing more than the clothes they are wearing. Women, children, even men come to this place and need the very basics immediately. The items that are weighing me down would be a godsend to them. Just the motivation I need.

What is this place, you might be wondering? My local domestic violence shelter.

And if the stuff I complain about, put off decisions about and generally feel encumbered by can give someone a boost toward freedom, I AM IN!

So, starting today, I am cleaning out with a vengeance. All it took was the right connection in my brain.

So, I have three questions for you:

1) Are you encumbered by too much stuff?

2) Are you willing to let go of any of it?

3) Is there someone who would could really USE the things that are just taking up space around you?

P.S. Martha Beck always talks about how our houses is a metaphor for our lives. GULP! I don’t want a life crammed with stuff that weighs me down!

I love naps. I can think of nothing more decadent and more re-charging that catching a snooze in the middle of the day. On the weekends our entire schedule is built around the whole house taking at least a one hour nap each day. It’s serious business around here.

And, at the request of @WarrenWhitlock, I am going to share with you a) why I believe naps are critical and b) some of my best tips for getting the most from your nap time.

So first, why do I thinks naps are so crucial?

1) We live in a rush-rush-rush, over-stimulating, sleep-deprived world. In fact we kind of glorify how fast we can do something and how little sleep we did it on. This is physically and emotionally unsustainable. Your body will rebel. You will get sick. You will run out of steam. You will b e an emotional mess. It’s just a matter of time.

2) We MUST give ourselves the gift of re-charging. Even if we love what we do, we can’t push ourselves on a indefinite adrenline-fed frenzy. Our brains, that organ we depend on to produce our brilliant work, simply cannot fire on all cylinders without rest. It’s like asking your body to run a marathon while eating one meal a day.

3) Our brains and our subconscious produce fascinating ideas and connections when they are at rest but not in full REM sleep. (REM sleep produces great stuff too – it’s just a different kind of great stuff.)

There are tons of really good reasons for taking a nap. And the media has caught on because I’ve seen articles and shows everywhere talking about how sleep-deprived culture really needs to take another look at napping.  In the comments I hope you will leave your best reason for napping – that will be fun to read!!

So, we know rest and re-charge is critical but lots of people say “I just can’t nap!”. Sometimes napping involves actually sleep occurring and sometimes it is just a chance for our brains to rest, dance around a flit from topic to topic. The point is that we set aside a time (about 20 minutes to start) and a place (more on that in a minute) to let ourselves sink into resting.

Here are some of my best ideas for for creating a naptastic nap.

1) Cool, semi dark room. Even in the winter I like to have a slow fan going. In the summer, a fan makes the covers feel that much better.

2) Your favorite pillow. You have one – I know you do. So make sure it is your napping pillow.

3) A blanket. No need to unmake the bed (assuming you made it), but covers are critical.

4) Take off your shoes, belt – anything that feels constraining. You can’t get comfy if you can’t wiggle your toes.

5) Turn off your cell phone and unplug the house phone. Trust me. Nothing will happen that you can’t handle 20 minutes from now.

6) It goes without saying that you are napping in a different room from your laptop, right?

7) Set your alarm. this will keep you from stressing out about oversleeping if you do actually fall asleep.  Again 20-45 minutes is about as long as a nap should last. Any longer and you may have trouble shaking the cobwebs out of your brain for the rest of the day.

Then again, I learned a lot about napping from a great boss I had in Washington, D.C. After lunch each day, he told me to hold his calls, he closed his office door, and laid down on the floor for 45 minutes falling fast asleep. Find what works for you.

So I am anxious to know your thoughts about napping. Do you nap? Do you resist napping? Do you have nips for creating a great nap environment?!  Please share – you know that is my favorite part.

Photo:

So yesterday pretty much the entire world was annoying me. Everywhere I turned it seemed I was dealing with an idiot or someone mean or someone who just didn’t get it. And I kept getting crabbier and crabbier and crabbier. Just ask my family members who had to deal with me.

And then – it hit me. If the entire world is irritating, chance are it isn’t the world who has the problem. It’s me.

<SMACK>

One of the great double-edged swords of living this conscious life is that I have to take responsibility for creating my own reality. Having to do that sucks sometimes because, boy, is it easier – and way more palatable – to play the victim and blame everyone else.  It also feels really good, at least for a little while.

But, in the end, it all comes down to me and catching myself in this cycle of pissiness.  And I am going to share a tool with you that I learned long ago that helps me derail bad moods, poor knee jerk reactions, and any other bad behavior that a moment of thought would have prevented.

It’s called the Pause Button.

Just like the pause button on your remote, hitting it stops the action. Why is this a good thing? Because stopping the action give me a chance to breathe, to reflect, to make better choices about how I am thinking and how I am acting.

I remember when I learned about this concept ( I was a grown woman), it was startling to me. “You mean I don’t HAVE to react immediately? You mean my auto-response may not be the best response? You mean I have a CHOICE?”  (Read those words with an indignant tone and you’ll get the drift of my thinking at the time.)

Here’s what I can tell you, though. I have never once regretted hitting the pause button. Not one time. But there have been PLENTY of times when I regretted not hitting it to give myself a chance to breathe, collect my thoughts and proceed in a proactive not reactive way.

So the next time you feel grumpy, reactive, indignant, urgent, angry, try hitting the Pause Button as fast as you possibly can. You be glad you gave yourself the gift of some breathing room.

As for me – well, thankfully I hit the pause button, checked in with @ElizabethPW and @AllisonNazarian, got myself collected and realized that an attitude adjustment on my part would miraculously shift my perception of the world.

P.S. Last of my shameless slef-promotion plugs for a while: You still have time to shift your business into high gear, build a strong foundation and put yourself on the map by joining my eight week coaching program that starts tomorrow (Wednesday), April 14. http://bit.ly/RearInGear

And here is a song dedicated to you – my tribe:

Don’t You (Forget About Me) by Simple Minds http://tinysong.com/6Wee

One of my (almost) daily habits is taking a walk.  I do this both as physical exercise and as mediation time.  Walking allows me to clear my head and ideas and solutions appear as if by magic.

People often ask me what I listen to when I walk. The short answer is I don’t listen to anything. In fact, to allow walking to work is special ju-ju on me, I have some particular practices that observe that I thought I would share.

1. I don’t listen to music or anything that puts speakers in my ears.

2. I usually don’t walk with a friend.

3. I walk outdoors as often as I can.

Because I don’t drown my senses in noise or distraction, I find that I

a) I pay attention to details.

b) I am fully present with my body and with my environment.

c)  I have a  keener power of internal observation.

d) I actually see things – the person walking down the street, the tree on the corner that’s just started to leaf out, the color of that car that would look great in one of my next blog designs. And if I am lucky, I get the hear the bells from the church in my neighborhood.

And, at least to me, I am a better person because I don’t shut out the world around me.

So my challenge to you is this: the next time you start to turn on your ipod to shut out what is going on around you, don’t. I’ll be curious to know how that unfolds for you.

I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about my SXSWi experience. My very favorite part was meeting, connecting and hanging out with people who matter a lot to me. We are separated by distance – and some of them I’d never even seen in real life. So walking around, sharing meals, going with “flow”, laughing and talking while in their company was a total charge. I wouldn’t trade that time for anything.

Interestingly, though, while all this great relationship building stuff was happening, I was also engaged in a  persistent and consistent back channel conversation with LOTS of different people over and over again. At this huge, career changing event, there seemed to be a great disconnect between the fact that people were there to meet and engage with like-minded people and the opportunities to actually DO that.

There are twelve THOUSAND people at sxswi and very few formal  gatherings or gathering spots designed to facilitate the kind of connection and conversation that I heard people craving. If you are lucky enough to know people and get invited to the small, private parties, things are a little easier, but what about the majority of people who are not so well connected?

How do we integrate, meet, connect, converse and engage with others who are like minded, interested in the same things and then develop real relationships?

Chris Brogan wrote a spot on post ( of course) on his observations while he was in Austin. You can read it here. His quote…”Know what I saw more than anything else when I really took a moment to look around? Lonely people.” was spot on. I saw them everywhere too – yearning to connect, not wanting what the huge Super Parties had to offer and with no platform to empower them to do anything about it.

I thought about this… a lot. In fact, in one of my nap-induced fugue states, I began thinking about the challenges of navigating and engaging at a mega-event and how similar they are in many ways to navigating and engaging at a mega-church (think Rick Warren’s Saddleback Church in California). 

[And so you know how that connection was made in my sleepy brain, I had a conversation with the effervescent Rochelle Veturis the night before and she talked about her church, which happens to be Saddleback. See? I'm not as crazy as you think. Well, maybe I am but that is the subject of another post. ]

At any rate, here’s where my dreamy thoughts led me:

The challenges of a Mega Event and a Mega Church are actually quite similar.

Number 1:  A LOT of people are attracted to “the big idea” found in a single physical location.

Number 2:  A wide demographic of age, interests, personalities and desires are present in the audience.

Number 3:  The sheer logistics of helping thousands and thousands of diverse people get “fed” through relevant ideas, relevant conversations and relevant relationships is staggering.

I am certainly not saying that the entire burden of solving these challenges rests at the feet of the mega-event organizers. In fact, I would say that much of that weight must be carried by others who are willing to step in and fill this very real need.

Here are just a few ways that mega churches rise to the challenge and I believe there are lessons we can learn and apply as we find ways to put meaningful engagement high on the list of what actually happens at a mega event.

1) Very small (say eight to 10 people) groups gather around a core commonality – young singles, married no kids, married with kids, single again, etc.  This small group is where the most meaningful relationships are fostered. It becomes “home base”.

How this can be applied at a mega-event:

Volunteer leaders can pre-arrange dates, times and locations for non-star-power driven small group conversations. Of course keeping it to eight to ten people wouldn’t be possible but keeping it small and intimate could be. What would REALLY be awesome is if the rockstars took the time to participate in these small group conversations as actual participants. No fanfare, no entourage,  no big announcement. Just show up and contribute.

2) Hundreds of larger (say 75-100 people) groups gathered around a particular interest or topic, ie book discussion group, dad’s basketball group, professional women’s group, etc. An individual won’t connect with every single person in that room but they are incredibly likely to connect with three, four or five people in a meaningful way.

How this can be applied at a mega event:

Have “continuing the conversation” rooms set aside that have designated conversation themes. For example, at SXSWi, the themes might be “Getting heard in the crowded lifestyle space” or “How can the artists blogger actually get paid?” or “What wordpress plugins do you actually use?” – you get the idea. No facilitator or leader is present but when I walk into that room there are people there I can talk to.

Or

Have break out session after certain panels. Panels are not conversations. There are opportunities to ask questions of course but Q & A’s and conversation are very very different.

3) Offline and online channels connect members of the audience.

How this can be applied at a mega event:

Set up a site (official or otherwise) that allows  mini-groups to form prior to the event. These mini-groups can be based on geography, special interests or any other demographic so people have a chance to find their tribe and arrange to connect in real life once they arrive at the event.

Those are the three dream-state produced ideas that took hold in my napping brain. Are they perfect? No. Are there more, better ideas? Yes!

The trick is, I have to stop dreaming, talking and thinking about them and start putting feet under them. I may not have star power, but I have desire and I have the ability to fill some of that hunger for engagement I saw in Austin. Anyone with me?

As always, please make this post infinitly better by sharing your thoughts and ideas. That is always my favorite part.

It’s a term we hear all the the time.

“I resonate with that.”

“What he said really resonated with me.”

“She writes in a way that resonates with me.”

We all have a general idea of what the word means – something along the lines of “that really speaks to my heart”, right?

Today though I want to dig in a little deeper into where the word originated and tell you an amazing story about how I saw the word demonstrated live.

So first, a definition:

Resonate:

v.intr.

Good – but still not what I’m after. Let’s try Resonance.

res·o·nance (rz-nns)
n.
1. The quality or condition of being resonant: words that had resonance throughout his life.
2. Richness or significance, especially in evoking an association or strong emotion: “It is home and family that give resonance . . . to life” (George Gilder). “Israel, gateway to Mecca, is of course a land of religious resonance and geopolitical significance” (James Wolcott).
3. Physics The increase in amplitude of oscillation of an electric or mechanical system exposed to a periodic force whose frequency is equal or very close to the natural undamped frequency of the system.
4. Physics A subatomic particle lasting too short a time to be observed directly. The existence of such particles is usually inferred from a peak in the energy distribution of its decay products.
5. Acoustics Intensification and prolongation of sound, especially of a musical tone, produced by sympathetic vibration.
6. Linguistics Intensification of vocal tones during articulation, as by the air cavities of the mouth and nasal passages.
7. Medicine The sound produced by diagnostic percussion of the normal chest.
8. Chemistry The property of a compound having simultaneously the characteristics of two or more structural forms that differ only in the distribution of electrons. Such compounds are highly stable and cannot be properly represented by a single structural formula.

Now those are some VERY cool definitions!

I like this one: Richness or significance, especially in evoking an association or strong emotion: “It is home and family that give resonance . . . to life” (George Gilder).

And I am particularly interested in this one:

5. Acoustics Intensification and prolongation of sound, especially of a musical tone, produced by sympathetic vibration. Especially these words “sympathetic vibration”.

I believe that is the essence of resonance. When someone says, does or writes something that “resonates”, with us, I believe it creates a “sympathetic vibration” in our very core. The words vibrate and create a similar vibration within us which is why our response can often be so very visceral.

And here is the story of how I saw this illustrated.

I was at a conference and this topic of resonance came up. The speaker had a grand piano onstage and invited one of her friends onstage who is a professional singer. They lifted the top of the piano and put a microphone and small camera inside. The singer belted out and held a perfect “C” note. After about 90 seconds, the C string inside the piano began to vibrate and then hum the exact same “C” note. It was amazing.

Now, when something I hear or read or see strikes me deeply, I remember this image. My internal chords are vibrating and humming at the same level as that which moved me.

Isn’t that just beautiful?

As always, I am deeply interested in your thoughts and experiences around resonance and cannot WAIT to read what you share!