Regret

      When I was younger, I spent a lot of time wishing my circumstances were different, wishing I made different choices and decisions, wishing for a different life. I had quite a few regrets. In the past few years, I’ve realized that regret is a waste of time. You cannot change the past. You can learn from your decisions and ensure you do not repeat the ones that did not work out as you wanted them to. Why then, do so many of us live with regret? Rather than regret, learn the lesson. Realize that the decision you made at that time seemed like the right decision, and it was not only until you lived with your decision or choice, that you regretted it.

      Regret can take a lot of our time and our energy and change our focus from the present to the past. We can shape our present and future based on our decisions from the past that did not serve us well. The practice can hold true on a daily basis. If you said something you regret, then deal with it. Either employ the 24-hour rule, where you think about how you want to correct what you said before you try and fix it, or clarify your words immediately. For the most part, we are aware that we said or did something that someone else did not like. While we cannot control their emotions, we can control our reaction to them to ensure that we do not have regret.

      I think that dealing with regret takes a certain type of person. Someone who is accountable for their actions, meaning they understand their role in the situation, is more apt to be aware of the fact that whatever the choice or decision, you immediately know that it doesn’t sit well. If that’s the case, correct it. Take the necessary actions to right the wrong you feel will result in regret down the road (whether that is in five minutes or five years).

      There are so many people in my life who say I wish I did things differently; or if they had it to do over again they would do it differently. Again, you can only feel regret once you’ve realized that whatever decision or choice you made resulted in something you did not want. What I take from their words is an acute awareness of my own life and where I am going with it. I learn from their mistakes! While I am not a parrot of my friends, I am the sum of all the parts of my life, and that includes friends, family, acquaintances, co-workers, my decisions and my choices. I can honestly say that I have no regret. I can honestly say that while I did not make the best decisions throughout my life, I do not regret the decisions I did make. If I have any regret about my decisions then I would never have experienced love, friendship (however fleeting some of them were), work experiences, health experiences, etc.

      I always find it fascinating that two people can marry and then when the marriage ends, they have regret. I always ask “why do you have regret”? At some point you loved this person, and while you may grow apart, or one party is abusive, I still do not understand the regret part. It serves no purpose in our life. Learn from the mistake; learn to watch the signs, and take the action to make the change. If you find yourself down a path that you have been before, then chances are you will repeat your mistake; and find yourself, once again, with regret.

      Regret is a waste of our thoughts and emotions. If you have regret, then dig deep, learn what you did not like about the situation, and work to not repeat it. Rather than have regret, look at it as lessons learned.

      Yes, this is a short chapter. Why? Because I do not allow regret to take any of my time. 

Fear

      What is fear? When asked, most people respond with dying being their greatest fear. For me, it isn’t death or dying. I’m dead, finished, finito. Nothing else really matters at that point as far as my own life is concerned. I’m destined for other things and onwards I go into the abyss!

      I am not one to really think about fears. While from time to time, I feel fearful based on various circumstances in my life, I am not one to really focus on fear. I really had to put a lot of thought into this chapter because I think the majority of people reading this will think I’m lying when I say I have no fears! What I was able to come up with is I guess I have two fears – in no particular order they are fear of being mentally alert while physically incapable; and losing the love of my life. I thought another fear may be being physically capable and mentally incapable, but then what do I care, I’m not aware of what I’m doing, so why worry about it!

      I do not want to make light of fear because it is real and it is present in our day to day lives. I do believe that it is a wasted emotion. If you live in constant fear, then you are not living. You are imagining a future that is not what you want. I use ‘imagining’ because chances are if you are afraid of it, then it hasn’t happened yet. Generally once something happens to us, we become less fearful of it because it is now known. Fear is of the unknown, and the possible circumstances that could result based on our fear. Take my fears for example. If I am trapped in my body and know it, I probably won’t be as afraid. At that point, I’ll need to cope with the circumstances. If I lose the love of my life (and for the record, I’ve lost him twice and have him now and plan on keeping him until one of us dies!), then I will miss him terribly and hope that I will have warm thoughts of our past to get me through it.

      I believe fear is more about not knowing than about the actual situation happening. Most of us have incredible imaginations, and for whatever reason, lean to imagining the worst case rather than the coping mechanism to deal with the situation. The expression walk a mile is one of my favourite expressions. There are people on this planet right now, which are living your fear(s). I wonder if you called them up and asked them “so, how is it?”, how they would respond; and would you believe them if their response was not nearly as catastrophic as you feared?

      I have had a few situations in my life that some would consider catastrophic. I lost my brother when I was twenty-six, he was twenty-nine; I lost three of my family members within five years; I lost my mother when I was thirty-two, she was fifty-three; I went bankrupt when I was thirty-two (no, thirty-two was not a stellar year for me!); I have been unemployed with no income three times in my life, and once I was one month away from living on the street. Those are some fears some people have and have never lived through, and for others, they are not afraid of any of those situations. For me, thinking my brother or mother will die was very sad, but I was not afraid. Going bankrupt and having no money was far scarier to me than death. Weird, huh? I don’t believe so. Death is part of life. It is inevitable. What might be scary is the method in which we die. Will we suffer first? Will it hurt? All of those questions; and the only time we will have an answer is when we die, and then it won’t really matter because we won’t be around to discuss it! My perspective is why focus on what I cannot control.

      Living in fear is non-productive for me. I make decisions that I am unhappy with, I focus on the fear instead of the plan to eliminate the threat, I am not in a positive frame of mind, and generally unpleasant to be around. What a waste! If I die when in that state of mind, I will be very upset! Of course, I’ll be dead, so it won’t really matter, will it.

      Fear is real, and I believe it is how you manage your fear that is important. If you focus on the fear, your outlook and behaviours reflect your fear.

      Throughout my life, when the fear is playing itself out, I often wonder if I made it happen. In this new age, where manifestation is ever present, did I actually manifest my fear, or would it have happened if I didn’t give it so much attention? I really won’t know, but what I do know, is when I was in fear of history repeating itself and I focused on it, it did; when I was in fear of history repeating itself and I thought “not this time” and gave it no attention, it didn’t. Things that make you go hmmmm….

      Operating from a place of fear affects those around us, both personally and professionally. We are unpleasant to be around, a bit of a downer, often we make bad decisions, and our colleagues, who really do not have to put up with our stuff start the gossip train. It compounds our already complicated life. I ask you “what is the point?”!

       If you acknowledge you have the fear and then resolve to either make a plan to mitigate it, or deal with it when it happens, the fear lessens, and may even disappear; and with any luck, you won’t have to walk that mile. Remember fear is false evidence appearing real. Do your best to not make your fears a reality by making a plan to mitigate them and then putting them aside. If the fear becomes reality, then put your plan into action. What I can offer is the reality of my fears were not nearly as scary when they actually happened, and I wasted a lot of time worrying about them long before they came to fruition.

Work Shouldn't Be Work

      In my experience leading teams, I find that when I get to know my team members, I gain an understanding of their likes and dislikes, what they are inherently good at, and what takes them effort to accomplish. I find that when I match the person with the tasks they like to do, they are great at it because it is not a struggle for them; they can feel proud of their work and they become more positive, confident even.

      Have you ever thought about the word work? It is almost a self-fulfilling prophecy! If work is work then you most likely do not enjoy it. If your career is fun, it’s most likely because you are good at it and have confidence in yourself. I looked up the word work in the dictionary and below are the various definitions provided:

      Exertion or effort directed to produce or accomplish something; labor; toil.

      Something on which exertion or labor is expended; a task or undertaking.

      Productive or operative activity.

      Employment, as in some form of industry, especially as a means of earning one’s livelihood.

      One’s place of employment

      Doesn’t really inspire one to want to work, does it? I would love to perform a study one day and find out how many employed people love their job, how many people go to work because they need the money to survive, and how many people would continue to work if they won the lottery. I think the results would be interesting.

      I love what I do and for me, it isn’t work. When I am engaged on a contract where I enjoy the tasks and the people, I am excited when I awake and look forward to getting to the client site. When I am engaged on a contract where I love the tasks and not the people, I work from home and want to be as far away from the client site as I can. This is an insight into myself I recently gained. I am lucky in that I always love the contracts I win because I am always doing what I love. I do not bid on contracts for work I do not like to do, so I am grateful.

      When I think about the difference between a good day and a bad day, or a good contract and a bad contract, the difference is always the same; it’s the people. The people with whom I am surrounded make the difference between my good day/good contract and bad day/bad contract. If you think about it, how can you get angry at a task (OK, there are times I want to throw my computer or cell phone out the window!); and if you think about it, is it the task making you angry, is it the fact you have to do the task, is it how you were asked to do the task, is it the tool for which you are using, or is it other people’s influences making you angry? For me, it can be the fact I have to do it, the tool, or the people. Most frequently, it is the tool causing me distress! If I am angry I have to do the task; that generally relates to a person. That person could not do the task or did it so poorly I am asked to re-do it. When that occurs, I offer to sit with the person and help them understand how to do the task so that the next time (or next two times) they do it, they can do it better. If that does not work, then typically I will speak with their leader and recommend the leader understand what this person likes to do and then match their skillset with the appropriate job. Again, no one comes to work with the intention of screwing up!

      So how do you go about changing your mindset from having to go to work to wanting to go to your job? Spend some time thinking about what comes easy and naturally to you. What excites you? What can you do that comes naturally to you, excites you, and will actually pay you money to do it?! Then either have the conversation with your current leader or look for a new opportunity. You are fully in control of your life. If you want a change, you can change it; no one else can do that for you.

      If you are a leader and you have disengaged staff, spend the time learning about what they like/dislike. Include your own observations in terms what that person is good at, and then re-align what they do with what they want to do. Typically when someone likes to do something, they are good at it, and it comes easy to them. Having a happy team promotes a healthy, productive, even cohesive environment.

      We spend approximately fifty years working. Imagine how great a life we would have if we enjoyed it.

Leadership

      After working in the technology sector for the last twenty years, I had the opportunity to work with some of the most amazing leaders, and some of the worst! What makes an amazing or leader, you ask? Well, it probably isn’t quite what you think, like a formal education or anything like that. Being a member of many teams over my career, the best leaders, in my humble opinion, are people people. They know how to work with adults, they know how to treat adults as adults, they even know when to pass along appropriate information and when not too. I guess, depending on where you are on the corporate ladder, your idea of a good leader may differ from mine; someone who spent her career being led by one.

      One of the key success factors for dealing with any adult is to tell them where you’ve been and tell them where you are going, and then repeat. Contrary to popular belief, the typical human cannot read minds. Communication is paramount to the success of any good leader and information is paramount to the success of their team members. Complaining about your team members, putting them down, withholding information, telling them they never follow direction, etc., are unfair and just plain insulting. I often wonder if these ignorant leaders take the time to think about the fact that there are very few people who get up each morning, head to work, and think “Today I think I’ll screw up everything I do.”; or “Today I think I will be in a bad mood and be unpleasant to everyone around me.” While there may be some people like that, I truly do not believe even one-percent of the working population thinks these thoughts! Why then, do leaders make these types of uninformed and ignorant comments about their team members (or peers, etc.):

I never receive your work on time or in the correct format.

While you deliver, what you deliver is poor quality and I have to re-do it.

I never get what I ask for.

No one ever shows up to my meetings.

They’re idiots.

They have no clue what they are doing.

While this is good work, I did not ask you to do it.

This is not in the correct format.

      The list can go on and on. My interpretation of the above statements or any statement like them is that you are not clear. You did not provide the tools and information necessary to help your team be successful. If you want deliverables on a certain date, or in a particular format tell your team. Go so far as to hold a little training session at the onset and walk through what they are supposed to do, what format you require, the delivery date, etc.; and if your team delivers more than you asked for, congratulate them; do not put them down.

      I worked on a short-term contract and while my scope changed on a daily basis for a month, I finally put together what I felt I needed to deliver and sent it to the person for which I worked. The leader agreed and I got started. My initial timeline was three months and with one month wasted because they didn’t know what to do; my new timeline was two months, same scope. I worked endless hours and not only delivered what I was contracted to deliver, I delivered more. While the senior executive was thrilled, they, in a very senior position, spoke with each senior executive and indicated that I was not contracted to deliver that piece. What is ironic is the piece I was not supposed to deliver was the piece with which they moved forward. Because I had great relationships with the senior executive, they told me, a contractor, what they were saying about me. I actually laughed. I thought it was incredibly funny that first, a Director is trash talking the contractor they hired; and second a Director is telling others more senior to her that the very contractor she hired did something she wasn’t supposed to do. In my experience, that is their failure, not mine, and the last thing I would do is tell others how horrible my staff is while being responsible for them!

      It is a leader’s responsibility to ensure their staff is doing what they are supposed to be doing, and doing it in the correct fashion. Enabling staff to be successful makes a leader successful.

      As I am a consultant, I work in many different organizations with many different types of people at all different levels. In twenty years of consulting, the common denominator for all good leaders is they are people people. They are respectful, good listeners, know their team member’s strengths and weaknesses (and if they do not know, they find out), and put the right people in the right job. The worst leaders lack confidence, are more interested in where they are going than what they are doing, do not care about their staff, are poor listeners and observers, and finally, think they are always right. I believe a poor leader is driven by ego; a good leader is driven by success and knows that they cannot be successful without a good team. Forget the adage There is no “I” in team. I think it should be There is no “I’ in Success.

      If you want success you need a good support system. If you want a good support system, you need to understand what that support system needs to thrive. Take the time to learn about your team, ask them what works for them and what doesn’t; ask them what they like to do and what they do not like to do; typically if someone likes to do something, then they’ll be great at doing it and it will be effortless for them.

      Be clear, be concise, and if you always complain about the format of your deliverables, then create templates and provide training. This will ensure that you always get what you want in the desirable format.

      Listen! If you are talking you are not listening.

      Speak positively about everyone. If you call someone stupid, then they will be stupid. If you call someone smart, then they will be smart. Everyone is good at something. As a leader, it is your responsibility to find out what that is.

      If you have to repeat instructions, or consistently correct the same mistakes, then you were not clear the first time. Ask your team questions to ensure you are all on the same page and understand what needs to happen, how, and when.

      Provide the right amount of oversight. Some people like daily check-ins, others like weekly or monthly. Again, gaining insight into what works and what does not work for each of your team members will make you all successful, and remember There is no “I’ in Success.

What We Pay Attention To

      Throughout my career, I have experienced many highs and lows. By highs, I refer to the progression of my career and the opinions of my superiors; by lows, I refer to the gossip spread about me and various attempts to destroy my reputation. In all lows, there is a consistent theme of my superiors and their peers supporting me; however, what I notice about myself is that I pay attention to the gossip. I let it get into my heart and mind and I focus on it. I sit here wondering why I focus on the negative, when the positive is also true, and the positive is in the minds of those that can keep me or fire me! A very wise and dear friend once said to me Keep those positive comments coming back and remember, if the criticism isn’t productive, constructive, and fact based, it doesn’t deserve further consideration. Truer words were never spoken.

      In all lows in our life, we need to focus on the highs; the positives. In all lows there can be lessons, which we should also pay attention to; however, if you combine the positives with the negatives, the negatives become lessons learned and all in all, you can turn what you perceive as a negative situation, into a positive. Given enough time, you can even learn to be grateful for the negative because you learned something. Whether it is about yourself, or about human nature, you learned. If you find yourself in a series of lows, stop and take stock of your life, not the lives of those either creating or participating in the low. If the criticism isn’t productive, constructive, and fact based, it doesn’t deserve further consideration. Regardless of your mode of remembering things, keep this one in front of you.

      In all lows in our life are lessons. Pay attention to the lesson and how it pertains to who you are, who you want to be, and what perception of yourself you want to portray to others. Then be grateful for the lesson and move on. Don’t become victim to others perception of you. If you want to change how others view you, then change yourself and how you portray yourself to the world. If you want to play victim, that is also your choice; however, you will have a far happier life either learning the lesson or ignoring the situation. Regardless, the message I am trying to give you is the same…let it go!

Innocent Until Proven Guilty

      In most societies around the world there is a legal system whereby those accused of a crime are provided the opportunity and benefit to fight for themselves. Typically, an offender is charged with a crime, and they go to trial to defend themselves. Most of the time, there is enough proof of the crime to warrant a trial. Ergo, innocent until proven guilty. I do not find that in day to day life, we do this. Think of a time in your life where you had to defend yourself against something someone either accused you of or said about you. The moment you are placed in a state of defense you are guilty in the minds of others, and you must prove your innocence. That is the opposite of innocent until proven guilty. I think the adage needs to change to ‘guilty until proven innocent’.

      I have gone through several situations in my life where my character was called into question, where I had to defend myself against rumour, innuendo, and gossip (I think we have all been here). It is such a demoralizing experience and using our instincts as evolved humans, we fight. We fight for ourselves, our reputations, and in some cases, our livelihoods.

      What gives one person the power to defame another person? I think we have all defamed someone in our life, and I also think that the majority of us are not aware we have done so. It could be that is once again karma teaching us a lesson if the defamation happens to us, or it could be that you are a pawn in someone else’s karma that is teaching them the lesson. Regardless, you are in a position where you need to fight for what you see, as the truth. I believe that often, the proverbial ‘throwing under the bus’ stems from the ‘throwers’ insecurities and the victims strengths. Survival of the fittest, and all, right? If you cannot beat them with your brain, then just beat them. Many believe that our life is the most valuable resource on earth. It is, and I believe that our reputation is the most vulnerable. It can be boosted or destroyed in one sentence. It does not matter the credibility of the defamer, it only matters what those listening, hear, and choose to believe.

      So what are you to do when you are in a situation where you have to defend yourself against rumour, innuendo and gossip? You can fight for yourself, or you can become a victim to someone else’s opinion. Fighting does not mean to stand up and yell obscenities at your accuser. There are much more level-headed and credible ways to ‘bust the rumours’, for example:

      Do not feel like ’something has been done to you’. At some point, you were a participant in this person’s interactions. Think back about what the catalyst was, and how you participated in it. Pay close attention to the trigger so that you do not repeat it in the future.

      Keep your head held high. Do not stoop to the defamer’s level by retaliating with negative thoughts and opinions about them. Speak constructively, even positively about the person when confronted with ‘what do you think of what ‘so and so’ did to you. Do not participate in gossip sessions and water cooler talk. Keep your opinions to yourself. Be professional regardless of how unprofessional the situation is.

      Obtain enough evidence from those around you that you are not what is being said about you. Get it in writing. Forward constructive feedback to the defamer’s superiors. Keep a copy of all correspondence related to the defamation in case it progresses to the point of a law suit.

      Consider the source. Is this person a player in your life, or are they on the side lines of your life? Will this matter in 1 month from now?

      What I am trying to get you to do is be constructive about the situation. Emotions have no room for a fair fight, because it is typically emotions that started the fight in the first place. Be realistic, be truthful, accept your part in the drama, and then really consider how drastically the situation will affect your life, well-being, mental state, even livelihood.

      Yes, this all pertains to proving yourself innocent; however, at the end of the day, it is you that needs to look in the mirror at the end of it all and be able to look back at yourself. Do not worry about what will happen to them, I firmly believe karma will deal with it.

      You may need to make some drastic changes as a result; however, would you rather remain in your situation, or move to a situation that is far less damaging to you? Remember, it is all how you handle it, not how others view you. People can only destroy you, if you let them.

Attitude is Everything

      Each time I experience conflict, I evaluate it. Am I in conflict with everyone around me, or just one person? If only one person, then it can be fifty-fifty as to who is driving the conflict. If I am in conflict with many people, then I feel I am the common denominator. Think about it. If you speak with five different people, and all five conversations result in conflict, you are the common denominator in those five conversations!

      When I was younger, I wouldn’t pay attention to the conflict in my life; life just was life. Some days it was good and some days it was bad. As I get older, I pay attention. I pay attention to the relationships in my life, both personal and professional, and I find that if I am unhappy, then I have so much more conflict in my life; my tolerance level is very low so when someone says or does something that bothers me, I negatively react to it. When I am happy, I have a very high tolerance and much less conflict. Sounds so logical, yet so many people do not go through this evaluation process.

      Most of us have read or heard that your attitude is the difference between a good day and a bad day. On a good day, you can receive some comment, criticism even, and be good with it. On a bad day, the exact same statement can result in hurt feelings, which if not discussed, can morph into a full blown war. What is the difference? Your state of mind. The only thing you can control is what comes out of your own mouth, the tone in which you deliver it, and the emotion that you attach to it.

      We are a society of wanting things faster, smarter, and cheaper. We have to re-learn how to communicate, and do so in such a method that is quick, clear, and concise. On the other hand, we are a society moving towards kindness and positivity. These two concepts alone can be contradictory. Brevity can often come across as direct or abrupt (negative connotation), while emotion can come across as indirect and inarticulate (also a negative connotation). If you are having a good day, you will see the positivity in the abruptness. If you are having a bad day, you will see the negativity in the abruptness.

      While I am sure there are many schools of thought on emotions in the work place, I do not believe that personal emotions belong there. My rule is whatever happens at home, stays at home; whatever happens at work stays at work. I do this visualization thing where before I walk into an office building, I visualize that no one in that building is emotionally allowed past my elbow. I imagine holding my arm straight out, and the only emotional space colleagues can occupy is from my fingertips to my elbow. Anything past my elbow is a ‘no fly zone’ for work people. Period. While this may sound cold to you, I foster and maintain excellent working relationships with people and I feel it is because I do not allow my emotions to rule my work.

      I believe there is a fine line between being emotionally invested in the work you do, and bringing your emotions to work. I view the former as passion and the latter as weakness. Emotional investment in my work is my passion; being emotional at work is my weakness. Make sense? While there are varying degrees of emotion, some overt others more passive, there is still emotion. How you interpret that emotion makes the difference in your day.

      Various sources cite that there are two types of communicators – direct and indirect. A quick ‘tell’ is a direct communicator may begin a sentence with I think, while an indirect communicator may begin a sentence with I feel. I think the best communicators are adaptable and modify their statements based on their audience, and leave their personal emotions out of it.

      If you leave your emotions at home, then logic dictates that you should always have a good day at work. And vice versa at home, leave your work emotions at work. Yes, that is my logic! If you imagine for a moment, a world where you walk into work, your memory of all other aspects of your life are erased and you can only think about work, ergo, there are no outside influences dictating your state of mind. You work at a job you enjoy and with people you enjoy, then wouldn’t you always have good days? Imagine the same of your private life, there is no work to influence your private life, and you surround yourself with people and activities you enjoy, then wouldn’t you always have good days? Why then, do we mesh the two together and start out with an emotion based on one or the other?

      Passion is good and emotion is good; however they are not good when used in the wrong space at the wrong time. I do not believe the majority of us can flick a switch and turn off our outside world while at work, and turn off our work while in the outside world. What we can (and should do) though is reign in our emotions. Understand that we are in control of them; we are the difference between our own good day and bad day. No one else.

      So how do we do this? How do we put our negative emotions on the back burner so we can focus on the job at hand? While I do not pretend to have the solution, what works for me is visualization. Visualizing that when I leave my home, whatever stuff is going on there, stays there. Same for work. When my husband asks me how my day is, I respond with great! When colleagues ask me how my weekend was, I respond with great. For some, I may elaborate, others I do not, and only my closest friends know the truth. My attitude is dictated by my own words – Great! My colleagues are amazed that I am always happy, which inside I find funny, and I am also proud. It is none of their business what goes on in my private life, so why go there. My attitude is the difference between a good day and a bad day. Sorry to tell you, you are the only difference between a good day and a bad day. You are in control of how much or how little conflict you have in your life.