Drained

Post meeting let down day.

The day following a Senior management meeting is, for me, one of the hardest workdays of the year (lucky me: they happen four times a year). The amount of effort that goes into each of these - about 40 hours of preparation, the meeting itself ( around 2 hours) and the post meeting write up and sign off (about another 2 hours) equates into so much effort going into the thing that, once down, I simply collapse internally.

This is always a bit difficult as one has all the other work which one is required to do which has essentially been put on hold while I attempt to do my best on a very visible piece of work. Even this morning I'm dragging as I move in my morning routine: the will to do what I normally do is simply not there.

The exercise, of course, is a good one: making presentations to senior management is always a good idea and the exercise of creating, reviewing and interpreting metrics is a useful skill that I can apply in may areas of my life. But the other part of me, the part that is slowly trying to rebuild the energy to go forward and continue with everything else that needs to be done, is asking the question "really?".

Presentations like this and the results remind me of the fact that, at heart, I am an introvert: performing for large crowds, while there may be some thrill in the version of holding people's attention and being recognized, is draining to me. I would still rather talk in a group of ten rather than present to a group of hundred. One can leave me engaged and excited; the other simply leaves me trying to get through the day after.

My Father's Brother

My father's brother died yesterday.

He was in fact my uncle, but I say "My father's brother" because of all my aunts and uncles, he was the one which we least saw - in fact, in the last 20 years I have probably saw him three times. "Uncle" can be as much of an honorific as it can be a statement of relationship.

His life was a series of ups and downs, partially brought on by conditions beyond his control - Type I childhood diabetes and the resulting health concerns which dogged him all his life at time when so much less was known, at least one business failure - and partially by decisions which he made which did not turn out well (as if we always made decisions which do). He usually lived far away and so we did not often see them, although I wonder now if that not only the simple fact of living busy lives as it was an conscious output on both sides to keep the peace.

The talk with my father ironically came at the end of a long day that I was feeling drained: a long day of preparing and re-preparing for the presentation to senior management tomorrow, followed by a quick dinner with the family to celebrate Valentine's day and then running off to Iaido class - the pressures of modern living, one could say.

And all of a sudden, the pressure comes off.

Death is the great perspective adjustor. We can profit from it when it happens around us, taking heed to the matters that are truly important versus what we convince ourselves are important, and change the way we live. Alternately, we can see what happens and learn nothing from it - which will turn out to be the biggest surprise to us when we suddenly realize that there is simply o more time to do anything and those tasks and items we put off to "someday" have suddenly been put off to "never".

It's trite but it's true: If you knew you would die tomorrow, what would you change about how you lived today?

Champis the Sheepherding Rabbit

In honor of Valentine's Day (and because I think this is fabulous), today's blog is dedicated to Champis, the Swedish Sheep Herding Rabbit. Enjoy!

Cold and Rainy

One of those cold mornings that you wish you could stay in bed.

The rain last night was an extension of yesterday: a morning temperature of 34 F, followed by sleet at 1300. We spent the rest of the cocooning in the house, avoiding the bitter cold (high of 41 F).

And then the night came.

I woke up this morning at around 0200 and 0345 to hear the rain hitting the roof and overflowing the gutter in front our bedroom which, no matter how hard I try to clean it out, continues to gather leaves and become clogged, becoming a stream right outside our bedroom window (but, I suppose, helpfully letting me know when it's raining hard). It was raining when I finally plunged myself out of bed at 0500; it is raining now as I write.

Outside temperature: 37 F (feels like 32 F!).

I sit inside at the computer and continue to gulp down my cup of hot coffee, then go to the back door and check the weather again. The blast of cold air and the dripping of the rain on my water storage barrels tells me that in spite of my wishes, the weather has not magically changed. I come back to the computer and have another shot of coffee, randomly thinking that the commute will not be pleasant this morning and mentally changing what I was going to wear to work.

Part of me is simply grateful for the rain, no matter what the temperature. We've had a hard summer this year and little enough rain so far, so anything - even when it comes with near freezing temperatures - is to be welcomed.

But there is another part - a part which, for the most part, is corralled in the back of my mind - which wishes that, for one day, it could simply convince me to "pretend" I never heard an alarm or thought that Monday was a holiday, turn off the computer and the lights, and head back to bed.

Integration

"Integrate what you believe into every single area of your life." - Meryl Streep

How well do we integrate what we believe into every single are of our lives?

If I consider it deeply, what I realize is that in many ways this is a concept which is often discusses as part of self-actualization but too often seems to be a luxury reserved for those who can afford it or those who are supported. Integration of what we believe - truly believe - is actually a costly endeavor - not just in terms of money, but in terms of reputation and the ability to survive - especially if your "integrated self" is contrary to the prevailing attitudes of the environment around you.

But does that make it a goal less worth striving for? Not all - in fact, as I continue to exist I find it to be one of the most important goals of all.

This concept of integration of our beliefs should be no surprise to the Christian, simply because this is what Christ expected of us: "He who has my commandments and keeps them, it is he who loves Me" (John 14:21a). In fact, the Torah is a compendium of God commanding the people of Israel to integrate their beliefs, not just in the inner person (The Ten Commandments) but physically and visually through the dietary, moral and social laws. The ideal Jew was to integrate their belief in God both inwardly and outwardly, through moral behavior and correct thinking as much as through the physical manifestations of avoiding ceremonial uncleanness and being set apart.

But perhaps there is a lesson in failure of the Jewish nation, that they became so focused on the outward manifestations of integration that they forgot the true point of the inward integration: to be holy as God is holy.

Inward integration of our beliefs is always much more difficult. It requires time; it requires thought; it requires continual application of our beliefs to our active lives - and it requires a great deal of courage to live that out. Outward integration to a movement or society is always much easier, simply because we don't have to much: just agree with whoever is in charge and do what they say and we'll blend in.

Those that have integrated their beliefs into their lives always stand out. I cannot specifically give a key to how to know them any more than I can point to a wind blowing in the open plain and say "There it is". The integration is so complete that they simply are what they appear to be.

So perhaps the real question to ask is not "Why am I not integrating my beliefs into my live?" Integration is a process like any other that can be accomplished as it's been done before. Perhaps the real, the profound question is "What do I believe?" and the second, "Do I believe it to the point of acting on it?"

What to Do

Pondering career stability last night.

I had a long talk with Bogha Frois last night about work and the world and the way of things. As it turns out, we share many of the same thoughts about our current choice of careers.

The biggest point for both of us is the fact that we don't like the fact that we are essentially dependent on an employer for a job. Ah, you may say, this is true of everyone that works for someone else. That's true enough, I suppose - but it doesn't change the fact that the reality is that my career is at the disposal of someone else. I could work diligently and still be let go due to circumstances beyond my control, whether it be a downturn in business, a personal grudge, or a need for a scapegoat.

Which leads to the second point: I don't like the general direction of the economy. It's not my point to argue the pros or cons of the current economic policies (there are plenty of websites that will discuss such things in great detail; we don't do politics here) - what my point is that I, at least, am not filled with a sense that any rebound in the economy will lead to anything remotely like the situation prior to crash.

The third point: If I'm not in control of my career and I'm concerned about the economy, where I don't want to end up in 10 to 15 years is essentially begging for a job in my field, knowing that I will be in too high salary bracket for many due to experience. I've had to interview such people once or twice in my career that I was hiring for. One floats through my mind yet I can't remember the particulars; what I do recall is this sense of a man who was as old my boss interviewing with a quiet sense of desperation because he needed the position. I don't want to be that guy.

So where does that leave me? I'm not really sure. I have always believed that those who are the best in the industry will always have jobs; the problem is being in that top bracket. I also look to my own industry, when seems to be in the continuing throes of layoffs and downsizing, further compacting the labor pool.

Start over in something else? I'm a little too far along for that I guess - although as a friend pointed out, since you've got a daughter in elementary school, you're not really too old period.

Do something on my own? Great in theory - lousy in the practice of deciding what that would be and how I would make it work. My history in this arena ala The Firm is not such that it makes me eager to try again.

Questions without answers, answers I seem to need.

The thing I don't want, the thing I fear more than all, is having these vague feelings and in 15 years saying "I should have done what I thought about" - but by then, it will be too late.

Control of Things

There is so much I am not in control of concerning my life.

I hate it.

When I say "so much", what I really seem to be saying to myself is the things that I really want to be in control of. The big things, like new jobs and raises and, in general, good things happening to me. Or the things that really impact me, like the decisions of others that have an influence on my life - wishing that I had a say in such things, or even that I was consulted for my input prior t the decision.

Alas, it is too often the case that none of this is true. I end up sitting on the sidelines, waiting in vain for input that is never requested or dealing with the consequence of a decision that I was never consulted on - or worst of all, simply waiting in a seemingly empty universe for something, anything, to happen.

What I do seem to get is ability to influence things which don't seem to matter very much. Small tasks which seem not even to happen themselves but require my involvement. Things like getting paperwork accomplished at work (which I have to get others to finish), or continually following up with someone, or even just accomplishing simple things around the house like raking leaves and mowing. Do I have complete control of these items? Yes, absolutely. Does it seem to make a difference in the vast scheme of things? No, not at all.

Why then is the universe structured in such a way?

I'm not sure. I guess one could posit that by learning to do small things which we can accomplish, we gain the "right" to influence bigger things. Possible I suppose, although that seems to suggest a progression of events which is too often not present.

One could also suggest that such an arrangement teaches us patience, to learn to wait for things (for the Christian, to wait upon God) until things happen in their own good time. This is possible as well, although the line between waiting and becoming inactive in the pursuit of that which needs to be done can be a thin one.

My best guess is simply that it is a training in the reality of life.

The reality is that we don't control large chunks of our lives. Take our physical being: we can eat well and exercise and sleep but we can't control when cancer appears or a genetic disease comes out of nowhere to strike us down. We can't control the weather around us that can lay waste to our homes and loved ones through wind and water. We certainly cannot control people, who often seem to hinder us or outright hurt us in ways that seem incomprehensible - we cannot make them call to offer us a job or companionship, and we certainly cannot make them change their minds. And ultimately, we cannot control the length of our lives: our death is a date unknown to virtually all of us and there is ultimately nothing we can do to extend it significantly beyond what it will be.

All of the issues we consider needful to control are, in fact, little issues in comparison with the very facts of life itself. What is a new job compared to the loss of one's home, the jolt of a random bonus compared to death? Could it be that God has established the universe this way to remind us that, ultimately, we are in control of very little?

I suppose it's comforting in an odd way - there are lots of things I can't control, but in reality I could have never controlled them anyway. The fact that I thought I could was an illusion based on a mistaken view of my own place in the universe. Accepting that there is much I cannot control frees me to focus on that which I can.

Perhaps the better thought would be to rejoice in the fact that I am given the ability to have an impact on anything at all.

Clarity

We lose too much by a lack of clarity and power.

The key (as I believe any highly paid consultant would tell you) to communication is clarity - not just that you have a message, but that you present that message clearly. That you do it in such a way that whoever was to hear the message understands it completely and well. That they leave with either a decision to make or something to accomplish or a piece of knowledge that they did not previously have.

We prize clarity. We cry for it. Yet somehow, we continuously find ourselves in the position that we feel our communications to be largely ineffective. Why is this?

One is perhaps a lack of confidence in ourselves and our message. We believe that what we have to communicate is important, but maybe we don't really believe it. Any failure, any wavering on that account will result in the message being garbled. We're too often not sure ourselves what we believe or that we are sufficient to bring the message.

Another is our perception of how the message will be received. People like to hear items that are good or praise them; they are much less receptive when the message is bad news or something about themselves which is less than praiseworthy. The more powerful people become, the seemingly less and less they like to hear such items. Why? If I had to hazard a guess, I would say that they have attained their position by trusting in their own abilities and efforts (and they have the results to prove it) and that anything which is in conflict with that view is immediately due to suspiscion as it does not otherwise reinforce their view. We can tend to pre-account for that view by imagining all possibilities (usually bad ones) of how the message will be received which changes how we give the message - before it is even delivered!

A third reason is often fear - fear for ourselves. Being the bearer of news which is not what people want or need often creates fear in ourselves - fear of how people will react, or even fear for the results of the communication. We tend to either try and parse our word for less than a full effect or blurt out the message as quickly as possible and retreat to our own mental burrow, where we fearfully wait for the effects to come as we huddle every time the earth around us quakes.

When people they want clarity of communication and they want the truth, they too often seldom really mean this. What they often mean is that that they want the truth that accords with the "truth" that they already know to be true in their lives. But how often we as communicators oblige this, by shying away from what should be said because we don't believe in the message or we predispose ourselves to how the message will be received or that we fear the results to ourselves.

Clarity in communication should probably seldom involve loud voices and shouting - occassionally they're necessary, but they don't make things more clear. Only by overcoming our own fears and reservations can we do that. We can seldom control how the message is received. We can only do our best to make sure it is as clear as possible.

Missing Center

Centering is so hard to do these days.

I've no real sense of a center right now. Life seems to be ripping by at about 1000 miles an hour, and if I'm lucky I can get about one tenth of it in.

How does one bring oneself back to the center of one's existence? So often in my own life events and tasks seem to be dictating what I should do and how I should do it, rather than me dictating such things to my life.

I seem more busy but less purposeful, more involved but less engaged, more movement driven but less destination achieving. It leads to a life that is constantly in motion but seldom doing anything of value, a life that is constantly doing but seldom making a difference, a life that is always "active" but seldom bring deep value to others.

Would that I could clear this fog of existence from my mind to refocus on that which is truly important and less of what claims for itself how important it is.

Simplify

Simplify. This is the word which has come up repeatedly in my life lately.

Part of it is an simply an extension of how time is flowing in my life - I'm continuing to find that I seemingly have less and less time - so I have to simplify what I can do with my time. They'll always be more to do than I will be able to do, so I have to more carefully choose what I will do.

Maybe some of this is simply part of the years passing - we learn that there are things that we are simply never going to do. I can hold out my hopes for a touring gig as a harpist, but I think the chances of that happening are small at this point.

On the other hand, things we can't do doesn't mean there aren't thing you should never do. Maybe I'll never be a harpist, but I picked up the mandolin. Sure, I won't ever be a performing genius, but I'm learning something new.

It's also looking at everything which is in your life and questioning the presence of each thing that is there. Where did these come from - I mean really come from, not just the fact that they've been in my life forever. Why am I doing them? Should I continue to do them? In Brian Tracy's words "Knowing what you know now, would you start/continue this thing?"

It's hard letting go everywhere - at work, where delegation becomes a fact of life and at home, where perhaps things which have become as comfortable as a good set of sweatpants are moved on in our lives. But the benefits are seeming to outweigh the pain: less clutter (physically and psychically), a greater sense of choice about what one does, and the very real sense that one is using one's time in the very best way possible, doing the things that are really important.

Communication

Communication. The Killer.

The Killer, you ask? Isn't a lack of communication the dangerous condition? After all, if we are communicating, then in theory we are talking about the same things. It's only when people or countries or businesses fail to communicate that things can become difficult.

True in one sense - obviously if there is no communication at all, issues are not being addressed and problems are not being solved. Allowed to go long enough, a lack of communication will result in the destruction of whatever needs to be communicated about.

But communication can be a killer to.

Why? Because too often when we communicate we think we are discussing the same items and issues. We may use the same words, we may use the same concepts, we may even leave with goals and "to do" lists, yet we never actually communicated about the issues we thought we were discussing. In this scenario both parties leave the conversation thinking that the other understands their position and what needs to be done.

Then, suddenly, two days or two weeks or two months later, the parties look around and realize that the nothing they discussed came to fruition. "How can this be?" they ask. "We had meetings and project teams and minutes around this subject? We talked and made plans. We communicated."

"We communicated." Perhaps. We talked, at least. We assumed we had communicated. But did we really?

Communication, to be truly effective, needs not only to be done, but to be done thoroughly and to the point of understanding. Only then will our conversation of issues turn to communication about the issues.

Successful and Unsuccessful

The unsuccessful drives out the successful.

I got an e-mail from an old coworker yesterday about a visit he had yesterday from an agency. It was his first visist, especially after he revised their operations in the industry we both work in. The result: a very successful audit and a vindication of the work he put in to revising the systems.

I was happy for my coworker - in our field of work, one seldom gets a such a vindication that the changes and work does are successful. At the same time it made me shake my head: this individual used to work at the company I am at. He could have employed this same level of dedication and diligence and change to where he was.

But he left - not because he didn't try, not because of a lack of trying, but because the company simply did not want to hear what he had to say, or the fact that the one saying it was someone that they did not consider to be of appropriate rank.

And so he went - off to another company, where (apparently) he's doing quite well.

There are many reasons that people, companies or movements fail. But one of the most obvious is that they lose the ability to hear the truth, or they lose the ability to hear the truth and act on it. What it results in ultimately is not a stronger company because the hierarchy was preserved and the "systems" worked; what it results in is people of talent and drive taken their skills somewhere else to where they are valued. Such people will succeed and more often than not, the companies or movements they are involved with will succeed too.

And the unsuccessful? They'll sit in the corner, badmouthing those the left and declaring them "difficult to work with" or "uncaring" or "not a team player".

It's not that they're not a team player - it's just that they are playing for teams that want to win.

Finding a Calling

Do Callings call?

I'm wondering that because I'm still digesting through the backwash of my last year and my review. Simply put, the take away lesson was no matter how hard I work on tasks that keep daily operations going it is irrelevant: only so much as I do what others feel need to be done is there any method to success.

I cannot begin to relate how debilitating this has been to my work day. I am simply sapped of energy from before I leave the house until well after I arrive home. Work has become a grinding exercise in covering myself and slowing down to the point that I can be well assured I will not accomplish everything I know I will need to do - and in the knowing, I am even more dispirited.

But the most alarming thing happened yesterday as I was going about my business making copies to insert in a binder. I suddenly had the feeling that I was completely drained of my personality, myself: that I was little more than an extension of the company, that I was no longer myself.

The frightening thing was that I was too numb to care.

And that's why I ask: do callings call? I've no idea myself - I don't know if my brain if fried, but it simply cannot fathom the fact of doing something else other than what I do, even though I dislike what I do.

But I fear what another 2 years, let alone 20, of doing this will look like. Would I even recognize myself at the end, or will there simply be a shell, waiting for someone to tell it what to do?

What to Write?

Trying to find something to write about this morning. For some reason, the words are really not flowing.

At least not on electronic paper. They're swirling around in my head, of course - big words, portentous words, words that mean things, words that betray the inner workings of my soul.

That's one of the problems of writing in a format like this. Sometimes the problem is simply that I don't really have anything to write about. Other times is I have too much to write about, or at least too much that is too sensitive to write about.

Sensitive? Or painful? It's not as if I should be worried about how the information is received. The people I do know that read this will already know the issues; the people that don't know me personally would not recognize me from anyone else walking down the street with issues.

It's a different sort of sharing, I suppose - not the random sharing of Facebook where the passing events of the day are shared (as my pastor pointed out, most Facebook accounts are Life as we would like it, not life as we are), but the sharing at one or two levels below, the sharing of emotions and feelings and goals.

How much does one communicate to others (even the unknown readers on the Internet)? Does there ever come that moment when you've communicated too much? Or is it even really possible to those who are interested?

Words swirling around in my head, like the residual ground swirl in my coffee.

Goals versus Tasks

Goals versus tasks.

This concept has recently risen its head up in my life. I'm not quite sure what to do about it.

I understand the importance of goals. They give us things to work towards, things of value to ourselves. At the same time, "goals" do not account for a great deal of the day to day tasks that I (at least) have to accomplish. If I only worried about "goals", I would find myself quickly not accomplishing anything that I had to get done in the day.

Or do we rank goals over goals? If one goal is to accomplish something, but another is keep day to operations working, which goal is more important? And how do you present that argument to others? They look at the 20%; you do the 80% that needs doing.

I haven't quite figure out how to resolve this in my own mind. Goals without attention to tasks creates dreamers that never finish anything. Tasks without goals create dull daily slaves who never lift their eyes up from the ground.

How do I reconcile the two?

Communication

The howling wind and
rain and lightning speak clearly:
People not so much.

Stripped Away

This is the hard part. The part at which you realize you have erred -badly. The part at which you realize that you alone are responsible for your own errors, that there is nothing and no-one which they can be put upon.

One could make the argument that this is freeing in a way, that "we only see clearly through the lens of pain". Our excuses and our illusions are stripped away, our fantasies and appearances whirling into the maelstrom of reality, leaving only the reality of a situation for us to ponder and act upon. In some semi-mystical way which I don't fully apprehend, we must be deeply confronted before we will deep confront ourselves. For most of us, that can only occur through the painful application of the error and lessons learned.

The great challenge, of course, is remembering: remembering what we have learned when the pain is not so fresh, when the mistake has mellowed in our memory to that of a minor error, when we simply feel "okay" about things. Feeling okay and mellow are not crimes within themselves - so long as we do not forget.

For if we do, the experience is waiting for us around the corner yet again, hovering for the one error that will unleash the flood of self-realization and self-reflection until, at last, we finally learn that which we need.

Control

How much are we willing to make ourselves bear?

I've contemplated both the general day to day level of unhappiness I often feel in my life events and circumstances. As I was thinking on the issue, I suddenly realized that a great deal of what I endure are things which I pile on myself.

The reality is that there are a great many things that I cannot control in my life, in some cases things which greatly impact my day. For some reason I got the idea that if it does impact me, I should be able to control it.

Where this leads is down a road where one becomes bitter and angry because events, circumstances, people, etc. are never able to be controlled. I can't control others or how they act, I can't control (to a large part) the circumstances and events that come to me. But I think I should be able to, so I spend my time bearing around a weight of unhappiness because things aren't working the way they should. I become angry, bitter, and eventually hopeless.

Perhaps there is a better way - focus on the things I can control.

I can't control circumstances and events, but I can control how I react to them. I can't control people, but I can control how I react to them. And every circumstance or event, there are things I can control. I need to focus on those, and leave the others behind.

In a way that sounds silly as I write it. After all, the things I can't control are usually the more impactful on my life; the things I can control are the small things that don't seem to matter. But if I shed worry and anger by not worrying about that which I can't control, that makes the small things not so small at all.

And who knows - maybe by addressing the small things, the bigger things will make themselves available for addressing as well.

A Visit with Anger

Anger was waiting for me when I went for a walk last night.

I sighed as I saw him at the end of the court, but was resigned to the fact because my choices were either turn back and disappoint Syrah the Mighty in her walk or carry on and have the companion I was not expecting.

"I see you're walking early tonight" he said pleasantly enough as I turned the corner with Syrah sniffing along the edges of the sidewalk for past visitors.

"Getting it out of the way early" I responded. "What brings you out?"

He laughed to himself gently, at a joke I could not here. "What brings me out? Have you listened to yourself lately? It's not 'What brings me out?' - it's 'Why haven't I come out before now?'"

I sighed as we turned yet another corner and headed east. "Okay, I'll admit I've been a little frustrated of late." At Anger's snicker, I inserted "Fine. A lot frustrated at late. But it's not like I can just start ranting and raving at people."

"Oh, I know" said Anger. "That's why the alternative is so much more fun - to have you mumbling under your breath, to have you screaming in your mind. It's lots more entertaining than you just letting loose on people."

I spun to look at him. "That's not fair. It's not as if I can just start speaking my mind. You know that words, once loosed, cannot be recalled."

Anger was smug. "Oh, don't I know it. But I'm patient - you'll slip up sometimes soon, saying something to someone you'll regret too late. You're so angry all the time now - it's only a matter of playing the odds.

I stopped dead in the street. Anger started to walk past me, then waited, looking at me quizzically.

"What if I just stopped?"

"Stopped?"

"Yes, stopped. Just stopped being angry altogether. If I'm not angry, I'm not going to slip up - right?"

Anger looked at me like I was crazy for a moment, then stuttered. "S-stopped? But you can't stop. You've many frustrations in your life - and you can do nothing about them. Anger is the one emotion you have that will propel you to do anything at all. Those are your choices, you know - be angry and talk some kind of action, even if it's bad, or be accepting and do nothing. People that have accepted are people that do not accomplish."

I looked straight at him. "But can't I accept and take action on those things that I can take action on? That's taking action - maybe not on so many things and maybe not as successfully, but at least on things that maybe I can change."

I thought again. "You know, most of things I am angry at right now are things I can't change - people, circumstances, that sort of thing. Can't really do anything about those. But there are things - maybe small, but things - that I can do. Maybe I'll start with those and go from there."

I smiled at Anger again, still standing there in the street. "Syrah's pulling the leash, so I've got to go. Thanks for the walk. Maybe we can make a date of it?"

And with that I dragged off down the street following a dog intent on the scent of something, Anger still standing in the sodium lighting of the street looking for all the world as if something had just hit him.

Work Dream

I had a dream about starting a business last night. It was the strangest thing.

It was all the stranger for who was involved ( a cousin of mine whom I used to work for but haven't seen in years) and where it was (originally the old convenience store I worked in, but then a warehouse) and what it was (my current industry).

I suddenly "wake up" in my dream to find myself in what was obviously a manufacturing facility, which apparently was an extension of the convenience store I worked at in college for my cousin. The floor was not up to manufacturing requirements, but the sense was definitely that it was on its way. I went into one room, where Fear Beag was working on some piece of equipment (presumably for fermentation or milling or some such), where we talked for a few minutes about how it was going, then went out through a door which lead into a fairly large, empty warehouse.

In the warehouse were Fear Mor and An T-Saor, who were engaged in the process of assembling some sort of environmental units. I asked some random question, and An T-Saor pointed up to the back wall where he was assembling something. I left both of them working on the equipment as I walked through the rest of the facility which was essentially a shell with basic rooms.

I remember three thoughts as I woke up. The first was that whatever this was, it was a work in process and for some reason I was not entirely worried about the money. The second thought was that there was a real sense that success was here: that the four of us had found a niche in manufacturing that was small, desirable, and could be done by ourselves. The third - directly related to the second - was the sense that this was right, that this was going to succeed, and that I was enjoying myself doing something I apparently liked with people I liked.

It was a trio of delicious thoughts that followed me into waking up. Seldom - and surely not in the last 7 years - have I had such a dream about work that left me refreshed and ready to get up in the morning.

RIP

"Sic transit gloria mundi" (Thus passes the glory of this world) - Thomas A' Kempis

My parents called last night to let me know one of the guys I went to school with - Kindergarten through 8th and high school - passed away this week.

An odd thing. Someone I don't think I had spoken to for at least 20 years. At one time (in grammar school) we were great friends. In a small school with 25 kids in your class, you tended to be friends with everyone and passed through the years together. There was, in that day, not quite the separation that seems to occur now between children and their activities. We did sports or Scouts or 4-H - but not the exclusion of seeing each other at school and participating in each other's lives.

We began to lose touch after high school, that wonderful time when children begin to flex their wings and find their own way. We went different paths - and in a much larger school, different paths means little if any contact. After the great "hurrah" of graduation, things drifted apart even more quickly. The last time I remember seeing him was at about 23, when I went over with another friend to his apartment. After that, the nothing of two busy lives.

And now, suddenly, he's gone.

I'm not quite sure how to process it. There's a vague sort of grief - certainly a sadness for his family - but not the sense you would find of a close friend; after all, one announcement does not make up for 20 years of silence. At the same time he's my age. The hint of mortality nicks at one's mind as the thoughts roil through.

It certainly puts the things of the day - projects that must be completed, deadlines that are "critical" - in perspective. Death is that one great appointment on our calender - unknown to most of us - that we will not miss, yet strangely never blocks itself out on the Outlook calendars of our digital age.

My greatest memory? Being at his house, playing electric football: lining up the players, the quarterback with the cotton football, and then throwing the switch and hearing the horrid "buzz" of the motor and watching the players bounce all over the "field" in what was supposed to be an approximation of a football play.

Requiscat in Pace.

The Complicators

I've got another in my list of people types that prevent useful work from getting done: The Complicators.

Complicators can be a version of The Assigners as they share some of the same characteristics: they are known for giving work away that they don't or won't do themselves, and they certainly are not always useful in getting additional resources. The difference is that when Assigners are done with their damage, they at least go away; Complicators do not.

They hover; they yell. They make commitments to what they will do, then after it is done the renege on their consent - in some cases, they even don't remember that they agreed to it in the first place. They believe in the quality adage "Inspect what you expect", but fail to recall that they failed to communicate their expectations in the first place. They bend rules they tell others are inviolate if the circumstances require it, yet hold they standard for everyone else. On the road of meeting requirements and accomplishing tasks, they are the quicksand.

I continue to be amazed how corporations and companies which otherwise proclaim their wanting to succeed and do good often show myopia about the individuals who truly move things forward in their companies - and the individuals who do not.

Learning From Last Year

Jeffrey Gitomer - A business speaker and author whom I've read and enjoy - posted an article today about learning lessons from last year - not just that we boldly go forward into the New Year, but that we consider what has happened in the last year, rate them, and what lesson we learned from each of them.

It's a good idea - a great idea actually, coming from someone who is becoming more and more haunted by the fact that I continue to be stuck in the same place.

As I look back over my planners (I have them going back to 2003), what I realize is that most - or all - of the goals I continue to carry forward are the ones that I have had from year's past. In fact, with a few exceptions, if you looked at my earlier goals, you'd really wonder what year they came from.

Perhaps this one fact, more than any other, explains the feeling I've had of late that in a great many ways, my life is stuck on a treadmill, not really moving ahead but very slowly, almost imperceptibly, falling behind.

Great. So what am I going to do about it?

Two things. The first (which I can't do until I get back home from the audit) is to review 2011 in detail by what was intended, what was accomplished, and everything else that happened. It won't be a perfect review, but it will at least give me a sense of what did (or didn't happen).

The second thing I've actually started at work and will start for my personal life as well is a mistake log.

A mistake log? A simple worksheet with four columns: the date, what happened, the root cause of why it happened, and what I will do to correct it. It's a simplified version of a process that I use every day.

Is it working? I've already got three errors in it, three things that I actually always had issues with but have now recorded to remind myself not to do again.

Sometimes it's not that we lack the knowledge we need, it's that we fail to force ourselves to use it.

Results and Roses

The man who wants a garden fair,

Or small, or very big,

With flowers growing here and there

Must bend his back and dig.

The things are mighty few on earth

That wishes can attain.

What e'er we want of any worth

We've got to work to gain

It matters not what goal you seek,

It's secret here reposes.

You've got to dig from week to week

To get results or roses.

- Edward Guest (1881-1959)

Friday Morning

I sit looking out the window this morning on a cold Friday. The earlier glories of the sunrise I could see between the rooftops and the tree lines - a deep, almost scarlet red - has been displaced by the more orange-gold glow of the sun. If I angle my head just so, I can see one shaft of twinkling light hit my eye.

The sun has shed its reflective light on the clouds that are overhead. They are wispy white things, small in number with one lower gray twisted cloud that lays across half the sky like a snake. Unlike many of the clouds I've seen in my time here, these clouds do not seem to be in a particular hurry to go anywhere and are contented in hanging in the early morning light, as if to soak up as much heat as they can before they move on their way.

The yard below me is still in the dusky greens and browns of the pre-morning. The oaks have shed most of their leaves and are standing as bare sentinels in the yard over the profuse growth of greenery which magically appeared in the yard after our summer of drought when the rains came. Other than clover and the occasional grass blade, I could not give a name to the profusion of low lying plants in the yard. Both trees and grass seem to be yearning for the sunlight as well as if to prepare themselves for the colder night to come this evening.

Simple things: Light, trees, sky, clouds, plants. But they are here every day, ready for my eye to take note of the beauty that is literally in my own back yard.

The light is brightening now and the colors become more distinct. It is time for me to slip away from this window and backyard to continue its quiet, patient job of simply being.

Night Watch

Winter's midnight watch,

trees dance in leaf-whipped fervor:

cold front blowing in.

The Drain

I constantly am surprised (I don't really know why) how much work crowds the rest of my life out.

I make my goals at the beginning of the year, carefully crafting each for a particular aspect of my life. I make my daily task list, so that I can insure that things that are important to me get done on a daily basis. I try to include in my reading something which will inspire me towards greater efforts.

And then work happens.

It surprises me how much work can drain out of your life. By the time I get home, more often than not, I am beaten. The energy which one had hoped to pour into every other aspect of one's life has been routed into work, leaving the pickings for one's spirit to try and motivate.

No matter how hard I try, no matter how much I aspire to do otherwise, this is the way it always seems to be.

Is the problem with my work - that I simply expect too much out of the thing that supports myself and An Teaglach? Or is it that I expect too little out of myself - or too much? Am I fool to set so many aspirations and goals, only to see them constantly crash against the rocks of my employ?

I am confused - how do I correct this imbalance within my life?

The Blinding Flash

There comes a tipping point multiple point in our lives.

It's that tipping point when we realize something about ourselves, or remember it. It occurs when we suddenly find or discover something about ourselves - something that comes in the flash of an instant and then just sits there in the light of self discovery.

We have to rediscover it because most of use (okay, let's just say me) consistently have to be awakened from the slumber that we mentally and spiritually put ourselves into. We say we want one thing, but after a while we convince ourselves that we are really content with less than was what we wanted. We can continue like this for a while - sometimes years - but something will happen and that original desire floats to the surface. It's at that moment - the moment of self realization - that we are suddenly confronted by the gap between what we want and what we have settled for.

What do we do with that gap?

Typically one of two things, never correct. The first is that we tend to bury those feelings beneath the casing of duty - which just moves them down the road, where they erupt with greater intensity. The second is that we suddenly "freak out" and immediately follow our desires without thinking. This, too, seldom ends well.

Am I saying do nothing? Not at all - because (as I've learned to my pain) doing nothing makes nothing go away, it just compounds the issue for later. Nor am I saying immediately act on every desire and feeling. That's the act of an adolescent, and most of us seldom have the time or resources to remake a life the way a 17 year old does.

What I am saying is to act - but act with wisdom. It's not denying that those desires do not exist - indeed, unless addressed they will continue to come to the surface and create anxiety and anger in our lives, which is not wise. It's admitting that they exist and then saying "How can I incorporate these in my life in such a way that the disruption is minimized?"

It's the least easy of the three courses of action. But it stands as the only course of action that will produce the results of the desire that we cherish so greatly - and having integrated that one moment of self discovery, we can move on to find others hidden still more deeply.

The Crow and the Cormorant

Once upon a time there was a crow.

The crow was along river one day getting a drink when he noticed a black cormorant floating in the stream. The cormorant would effortlessly glide along, then suddenly dive down and come up with a tasty morsel of some kind, which it extended its beak and long neck to swallow. It would then continue on its effortless glide through the water, until it climbed out of the water to stand on a rock and hold its dark wings out to the side to dry them.

"How beautiful" said the crow. "It's so different from my life. I have to constantly fly around seeking insects and rice grains from the fields, constantly in threat from farmers and cats and bigger birds."

He looked down at himself. "I'm a black bird too!" he suddenly realized. "There's not a reason in the world why I, too, cannot become a cormorant."

So decided, he hopped off his rock perch and jumped into the river, expecting to settle along the top just like the cormorant. Instead, to his surprise, he sank like a rock. He struggled to keep his beak above the water, and barely managed to keep it up as the current of the river washed him ashore none too kindly. He sputtered and shook himself as he crawled back onto the rocks, wet and bedraggled and surely lacking the fish he had seen the cormorant catch and eat with ease. Suddenly he realized that his wet feathers would prevent him from flying if danger approached - and he certainly couldn't swim. He slunk to the edge of the river, hoping the warm sun would quickly dry his feathers.

Crows, he realized, were made to fly high and be clever and dodge farmers and cats and other birds and collect rice and insects - which suddenly sounded like a feast to him. They were never meant to swim.

U no mane suru karasu (The crow imitating the cormorant) - Japanese Proverb

"A crow imitating a cormorant cannot swim, and so will nearly drown. In the same way, every man should be true to his own craft or, in swordsmanship, his own talents and training. Musashi would have us be the cormorant if we are the cormorant, and the crow if we are the crow." - William Scott Wilson, The Lone Samurai: The Life of Miyamoto Musashi

Morning Surprise

Coffee cup in hand:

Pumpkin wafts up from my cup:

Autumn in Winter.

Trapped!

Why does business waste so much time in meetings instead of accomplishing?

I have been trapped in more meetings than I care to admit in which the point of the meeting was accomplished (or could have been accomplished) in 10 minutes - but the meeting had to run another 50 because a) the sense is a short meeting is not a successful meetings; and b) meetings are more about individuals being heard and showing themselves as important as it is about actually solving issues.

The reality is that too many work environments, work is seen as something which is as much about catering to the egos of individuals as it is the accomplishing of actually work - and the vehicle for this is the meeting, where individuals get to demonstrate their worth in front of higher ranked individuals by talking about how much they know or "demonstrating" their decision making abilities. The result? More meetings where less and less gets done, where people begin to find reasons not to go because it represents valuable time which is being poured down the drain for the purpose of making people feel important.

Meetings have a place - as long as they have a purpose. And the purpose is not and should never be "To make someone feel important" or "To show we're doing something". Work is for work, not the building up of or catering to egos. And if something needs to be done - do it. Don't have a meeting where no-one is accomplishing anything on the task because we have to talk about the task.

I would love to see meetings start out with following mantras:

1) What decisions are we here to make? Here's the list.

2) We are here to make those decisions. We are not here to make anyone feel important or better about themselves.

3) When we have made these decisions and assigned action items, we will leave.

Will this stop pointless meetings? I'm afraid not - too many people are wedded to the meeting as a way to self-validate their importance and self justify their position. But there is a chance that at least one other person will see what you're trying to do - and be grateful.

Perhaps they'll celebrate by having one less meeting.

The Tyranny of the Assigners

I am coming to greatly resent those who Assign.

I don't mind those who are Assigners yet work. They are fellow workers in the trenches, not only setting the policies of the future but willing to work alongside to execute them. They make the decisions -but then crawl down to the ground to make them happen.

No, what I am speaking of this morning are the Assigners who do nothing but assign. Those who create work without any thought as to how it will be executed. Those who create empires only to assign the work to others, while they "oversee" the work, while they "project manage" tasks that they have no idea how to complete themselves.

You can recognize them by their habits: building teams only to assign work, or just being by themselves, always finding ways to assign the critical tasks to others. Not informed of the projects they manage, they constantly seek updates and offer their assistance to "do what it takes" to get the task done - yet too often when assistance or resources are sought, they suddenly find themselves unable to negotiate to get such things.

But they have no problem negotiated the tasks down - indeed, they can often become benign (or not so benign) despots, constantly seeking updates and putting pressure about why things are not accomplished more quickly while scarcely paying attention to the other ongoing tasks which need to be accomplished.

If there is success, too often they take credit; if there is failure, too often they redirect the blame.

In my more idle moments I wonder to what extent resources and time are wasted (yes, I use the term advisedly) on people who make tasks and "assign" things yet don't really do any work - and why so many organizations don't see such things more clearly.

Sleep: An Act of Faith

Sleep is an act of faith.

Oh sure, I know it's a physical necessity and if we don't have it, our functionality drops off dramatically (The Romans supposedly killed the last king of Macedon, Perseus, by denying him sleep for a year). And there have been long scientific discussions about what the real purpose of sleep is, and do we need it, and could we do without (some can: one teacher I had could function well on 3 hours a night).

But sleep is an act of faith as well.

To sleep means that we are letting things out of our grasp. When we sleep, we can actually do nothing at all - except dream, and rebuild our cells. All our plans, our goals, our worries which we work on find our effort on them completely denied as we lapse into unconsciousness.

Some of us (me, for example) fight back by denying ourselves of sleep. We figure out ways to cram more into our days - mostly at the cost of sleep. 8 hours goes to 7, then 6, then we are trying to see how long we can go at 5. The fact that we stumble through the day as zombies and by Thursday are unable to really generate excitement about anything or that we sleep 10 hours a day on the weekends seems to mean nothing.

But in the end, do we accomplish that much?

I'm confronted with this myself. One of my resolutions is to get more sleep. At first I thought this would be an easy exercise: after all, I have no problems sleeping over the weekends. So into bed I go - and wake up. At 12:00, 2:00, 4:15, and 5:10. Each time I have to consciously lay there and decide I will not let my mind get agitated or active, that I will go to sleep, that waking and going will not really solve anything.

By adding sleep, I am surrendering control. I am choosing to act on the premise that sleep in more important than whatever "activity" I would be doing.

And an act of faith? By choosing to sleep, by forcing myself to do so, I am essentially admitting to God that I am finite - and He is not. He can accomplish all that He wants or needs me to do with my sleep or waking. "It is vain" says the Psalmist "That you rise up early and go late to rest, eating the bread of anxious toil; for he gives to His beloved sleep" (Psalm 127:2).

So tonight will find me like last night, undoubtedly popping awake for what I could being doing - and then, in a supreme act of faith in the providence and omnipotence of God, closing my eyes and going back to sleep.

Goal Setting

Confession: I've never been very good at setting goals.

I'd like to think I'm better. Every year, I start out with the best of intentions: things I think I want (or need) to accomplish, which I interpret as goals. And then, at the end of every year, I tend to look back, wondering which (if any of them) I accomplished and where the year went anyway. So last night, as I sat trying to work over my 2012 goals with varying results - mostly "What am I trying to really accomplish?" - I started going through my collection of books that deal with subject.

Enter Goal Setting 101 by Gary Ryan Blair. It's a short pamphlet really - 40 pages or so - but actually quite as useful as books three times its length. Mr. Blair has a short and succinct definition of a goal, something that works well for my simple way of working. A goal is defined as "An end toward which you direct specific effort" and consists of:

1) An accomplishment to be achieved.

2) A measurable outcome.

3) A specific data and time to accomplish the goal.

That's it. And that's pretty easy.

It took me a bit of time to adjust myself to writing them in the fashion. I'm used to doing them more in the form of what I'd like to do, not as a specific 3 step outcome. But what I found as I continued down this path is that things started to be put in a fashion and sense that I could understand. I not only identified what I wanted to do (I always seemed to do that), but also what that would actually look like (the outcome) and what time frame I wanted to accomplish it in.

I'm starting small this year doing this process (another issue I have, a separate one, is maybe trying to put too many things on my plate). And I've today to work on the ones that were not so easy for me to do last night, the ones that are either more personal or have greater implications.

Still, at least for this moment, I begin the year feeling more confident that I will see some of the results of the end of the year I want to - more confident than I have in years.

The Last Workday of the Year

It is The Last Workday of the Year.

The Last Workday of the Year shares many of the same aspects as The Last Day of Work Before Christmas. Most financial generation is over except for the billing. The list of what has to get down this week has continued to become shortened as the week has progressed, as much from "I can really do this next year" as "I accomplished this".

In their heart of hearts, people are waiting for the official announcement: "It's the last day of the year. Let's go home." They won't say this, of course, but they'll find other ways to review it - periodic counts of how many people are in the building, followed up by another count to see how many have left.

Even I am lingering this morning over my coffee as I prepare to get ready for work. The traffic has been great this week - the most direct route has only been 25 minutes, which it never is - so getting there "on time" is not the issue. And I, too, am mentally making my list as I prepare to get things chopped off or moved to next year.

Because in the end, today changes nothing. The reviews are already in, and 99.9% of my actions are accounted for. It will be a paperwork shuffle if anything - reviewing things that basically won't get done anyway than next year, as how much can you do in one day?

Is there a sense of accomplishment to this year of work? Not really. I can point to a great deal that I accomplished this year, but hardly with a sense of accomplishment. Why? Because there's no enduring sense that a difference was made. Already the projects and common daily tasks for next year are stacked higher than I can reach them. The year past then blends into the year to come: one long experience of projects which, so often, seem to lead nowhere.

Ironically, the greatest anticipation of this day is simply when we do get to leave. It is one of 3 days of the year where the possibility of leaving early exists - a something to look forward to in the midst of the seamless transfer from last year to this.

So Happy Last Workday of the Year. May all your tasks be completed.

Making Progress, Meaningless Work

"Making progress on meaningless work doesn't boost engagement; people must feel that they are contributing to something they value. " - Teresa Amabile and Steve Kramer

Progress on meaningless work - what a seemingly counter intuitive concept. By well-acknowledged definition, progress always means moving forward, moving towards an end goal, moving towards something better. But what if that progress is in something that has no meaning. Is it progress?

To use an example in my own life, if I complete the review of reams of documents which mean nothing outside the small circle of company I am in, have I really made any progress? Or have I just completed a task which more than likely will be filed away in a memory stick as part of an electronic archive in some years? Yes, I have checked items off my "to do" list, but have I really contributed anything in a meaningful way?

Yes, I agree with the hypothesis that such progress doesn't boost engagement of anyone; but I think the more fundamental question is "Does it represent true progress?"

As an employee, I want to be spending my time on things that matter, that make a difference or improve something. The same is true for me as a human as well, I suppose: I want to spend my time on things that are meaningful and involve progress (although often these are things of the heart: my cheese making, though I'm becoming more skilled at it, is hardly going to change the world). And even as a Christian, I want to make progress and be more obedient in the things that Christ desires, not in things which are trappings of the world or the mores and preferences of people.

Money cannot be a substitute for meaning; progress on the meaningless cannot be substitute for effort that makes an impact.

A Whiff of Grapeshot

Where do I want to go next year?

2012 already stands to have the scent of change, a "whiff of grapeshot" about it. Already - and it is not even the New Year yet - A' Bhan Ghradh has posted her intent to leave, and the unraveling of work has thus begun. I find it unlikely that this time next year my place of employ will resemble anything like it stands today. Looking at my circle of friends, I predict changes for many involved -Uisdean Ruadh, Snowflake, Bogha Frois, maybe even Otis (but in his case, only more success than he has already achieved).

Which leads me to the question above: where do I want to go next year?

Among the things I've managed to gather over the course of a career and life, one is that it never pays to be taken by surprise by events. Work environments can change in the blink of an eye with even the departure of one - and once changed, they become something different and not always pleasant.

Change is coming: what will I do about it?

I started to push my goals out onto paper last night. In general, they ones that flowed out were not ones that particularly surprised me: Physical, Financial, Personal, and even Professional were similar to years past (telling me that I really have never achieved any of them) with one small exception: the "Become a Published Author" moved from a personal to a professional goal.

That one scares me a little bit (all good goals should, right?), as it is 1) way outside my comfort zone and 2) making a declaration of sorts - the declaration that in some form or fashion, I'd like to write for a living. Scary stuff.

The two remaining categories - familial and spiritual - hover in the background, nagging at me a bit further. These, too, are areas of change for 2012 - or need to be. Familial needs to continue to be around relationships and doing things together (I am still stunned by the amount of interruption the layoff and move away put in in place); spiritual - I'm not sure yet what this part means, other than my commitment to Christ needs to be 1) Deeper and 2) More real.

The New Year is coming, and change is coming with it. Will I be ready - or I will swept away surprised that change came at all?

A Father's Gift

I think the most surprising gift I got this year was the one I didn't anticipate from the person I didn't anticipate it from.

I am a father of daughters. I have attempted, in my broken and fairly unorganized way, to raise them in such a way that they learn to stretch their wings and explore, to believe in God and the plan He has for them through the talents they've been given, that they learn to feel confident in using their talents and trying new things, and that they learn that their talents and gifts are not only for themselves alone, but for the good of others as well. Through them and their talents, they express the love of God to a world desperately in need of it.

A tall order to be sure, and one which I'm never quite sure I'm fulfilling well. There are times I see hints of it, but a great deal of time as well where it feels as if one is tilting at windmills. Do such things really have impacts on their lives of our daughters?

Enter the Christmas present. Enter Buttercup.

I get to cheat in a way that you, gentle readers, do not: I get to see her daily posts on Facebook. I have watched over the last few years as she undertook a dream which she had put aside - to get a college degree in teaching - which has morphed into her life's calling helping autistic children.

And here's the cool part: she speaks constantly in her writing of her father.

He passed on in July 2010 and so has never (physically) seen all that Buttercup has done in this time. But that hardly means he is not present in her mind: nay, her writings and thoughts drip of him with so many entries; even this year at Christmas, she speaks with high praise of a gift she received, a quilt made of his shirts, a physical reminder of his presence.

I say that his influence continues because she says that his influence continues in her life to this day: in her gardening, in her service to others, in her faith. She keeps on her desk a wooden apple, a constant reminder of him.

And a great comfort it has been to me as I work through what so often seems to be the wreckage of my life, hoping in some way or shape to inculcate what I would wish that my children would know and internalize long after I'm gone, to see that in at least one case that I know of and can attest to, such a thing actually can happen: we can do what we hope to do.

And that hope, that example, is the greatest gift I received at the end of one long year and the beginning of the next: lessons can be learned and lives influenced (and others therefore changed) by the example and lessons of a father.

The Year of Living Courageously

Dear Friends,

And so the end of another year is upon us, the looming gift of 366 days (Leap Year, you know) an unopened packaging waiting even as we close down the last week of this year.

Perhaps you, like me, are examining the year that has gone past, realizing that there was too little done for you wanted to do or what you needed to do and too much done that which had no lasting import; you find that the end of the year this year leaves you much in the same position that the beginning of the year did.

Let us take an oath, you and I: Let us make this The Year of Living Courageously.

Why Courageously? Because the world is in sore need of you. It is in sore need of the talents and gifts that you (and I) can supply.

And truth be told, you (and I) need to live up to a better and higher level. Truth be told, if we are where we were at the beginning of the year, we've actually declined, because we've lost a whole year of living.

But I warn you up front: The greatest obstacle to living courageously is not those around you (oh, they'll mock or discourage). It's not the circumstances that will seem to be against you (they will always be against you somehow). And it's not the tides of history that seemingly sweep away any change you desire to make in yourself or the world out to the sea of anonymity (these tides have always swept through human history).

No. The greatest obstacle will be yourself.

Courage is like any other talent. We have to train ourselves to use it. And the first time we use it - the first time we try to live courageously - it will feel like death. We'll feel as if we're a tender shoot, sitting in the hot New Home sun, withering under intense heat of the scrutiny of others but even more so under the scrutiny of ourselves. We'll feel embarrassed and unworthy and a failure.

We'll survive, of course. And we'll do it a second time. And a third time. And it will feel like dying again.

But over time, what we'll find is that courage is like any other muscle: use it enough and an iron-hard conviction will develop within us, something that is no longer swayed by the opinions of others - or the opinions of ourselves. Living courageously will become part of each and every action that we take.

I don't ask about your goals or aspirations or dreams. Live courageously, and these will flow out of you as naturally as breathing.

A few are born courageous - the rest must become so by effort.

Your Obedient Servant,

Toirdhealbheach Beucail

Christmas Away

This Christmas is a first in 44 years. It's the first Christmas I won't spending with my extended family.

For the course of my life, we've always been with extended family: with my parents (of course) and sister and my maternal grandparents through high school. In college, I came home for a bigger set of family - aunts, uncle, cousins, eventually a brother in-law as well. When The Ravishing Mrs. TB and I got married, I added another layer: in-laws and sister in-law and another set of aunt, uncle and cousins.

The arrival of children just meant we went more places: one day with my parents, one day with my in-laws, and occasional meanderings through the homes of other relatives. They were only 2 hours apart, so it hardly a stretch that we wouldn't see everyone during the Christmas season.

And this year, we will be by ourselves in New Home.

I'm not necessarily overly sad about it - I mean, compared to the sacrifices so many people actually make, this is a little thing. And it's not as if we're alone - we have Na Clann, which I'm sure will keep things interesting enough with the de-packaging and assembly of various Christmas arrivals. They'll not be an absence of joy or Christmas here.

I suppose the thing that made me start about it more is simply that it is happening - the sort of milestone that one realizes one has passed only after the car has flashed by it. It's more the realization of something being different than something missing that makes it interesting to me.

Sometimes the change in the season of life is so subtle that it escapes even ourselves.

The Last Day of Work Before Christmas

Today is The Last Day of Work Before Christmas.

The Last Day of Work Before Christmas is always a somewhat confused time. On the one hand, there are things that must get accomplished, especially in light of the fact that many people take the week after Christmas off, so signature and approvals will not be available before the end of the year. It's a madhouse of scurrying, writing, cajoling and whining to get things accomplished either now- or next year.

On the other hand, there is a sense that it is almost a day of non-work. Personnel on site are always about 40% of what is normally there, so many things simply can't get done. There's almost a sense of a holiday at work as well, the feeling that the clock is slowly ticking down to freedom. People take longer than they usually do to stop and drop off paperwork to chat for a few minutes with gloating or despairing depending on how much time they are taking off. Individually decisions are made about how much work actually can get accomplished by the end of the year: by 12 PM, people starting moving things off of their lists with the thought "I can do it next week when no-one is here" or "I can do it next year".

The one almost universal tradition - almost everywhere I've worked - starts around 2 PM or so, when people start checking their computers for the ever-hoped for "Let's close early" e-mail. In some places it's merely a periodic check; in others, work almost slows to nothing as individuals cluster like quail, wondering if it will happen or when.

But inevitably something happens - the "get out of work early" message or simply the winding down of people's day. By the time the end of the day rolls around, the workplace is silent - not just the silence of people being absent, but the more profound silence of people dropping their work cares and sorrows on the way out the door.

Writing by Christmas Tree Lights

The two weeks around Christmas are always unusual for anyone that has children, especially when they have holidays. The normal bustle I would associate with this time of morning has completely disappeared; everyone is sleeping in late today. The house is quiet, with the exception of Kiki the Pseudo-Eagle, who is testing the locked door of her cage to see if by chance it's open this time.

It's a overcast morning here in New Home: it is the cold of fog but not the its misty covering, the deadening without the blocking of vision. It's quiet as well: the vacation seems to have extended to those around us, as I can hardly hear the sounds of any cars motoring off to school or work.

Which leaves myself and the Christmas Tree.

The joy of Christmas Tree lights is that they bring a multi-coloured twinkle to the writing experience. They're not much for lighting any keyboard, but the red, green, yellow and blue play at the edges of my vision as I type. They bring a sort of seasonal cheerfulness to the morning as they silently light the coming of the Saviour. They cast a happy sort of silent cheer throughout the living room and throughout my heart.

There's a sense of peace I can't fully define as I sit in this silent house which is filled with my family at rest, as the pets quietly munch away or occasionally chirp, the Christmas Tree lights reflecting off the bottoms of my eyelashes and patchworking my sweatshirt with colour. I know the day is coming but somehow I cannot find it in myself to become concerned about it.

Sometimes, it seems, the greatest task is not so much doing as it is resting in the moment.

Short Entry Today?

Stupid Thunderstorms:

Making planes and people late.

All this and work too.

On The Road

I find I like traveling alone less and less.

Business travel is becoming more and more of a less desirable option. It wasn't always so - at one time, I was happy and excited to go. I liked going to new companies and new places, seeing how they did things, and then returning. I like what went along with it - hotels, eating out, travel points.

But now I find it much more of an undesirable option.

Why? The single biggest reason is that I now begrudge the time away from my family. Every night I'm here is a night I'm not with them, a night I'm not in familiar surroundings.

I like traveling much less than I used to as well. Not just the airport experience since 2011. The planes are more packed, the waits are longer, people and their darn "it can roll on, so it's a carry-on" - even if it takes an entire compartment's worth of space - are more annoying.

But it's the fact of being alone as well. I don't really like to eat out by myself, or really do anything alone - typically I'll find what's in the hotel to eat or right near it, get my food, then scuttle back to my room. I'm not one to find enjoyment in the "freedom" of being temporarily unencumbered by responsibilities.

Do I still like seeing other companies? Of course I do. That part is still very enjoyable to me. It's just the all the parts in between that have slowly lost their luster.

A Long Week

Slumped over coffee,

I look up in exhaustion:

Friday already?

Rain and the Universe

I woke up early this morning. After flopping around for a while, I got up to avoid disturbing The Ravishing Mrs. TB. I came downstairs and performed my usual morning routine - Read, Pray, a little theology, a little language - even a bit slower than I usually do them, as it was early and I had lots of time, right? Made Coffee. Unloaded the Dishwasher. Fed the Rabbits. And then finally got dressed to go running.

Literally, as I was tying my shoes, I heard the sound of rain starting to pour coming from outside.

I went outside and looked: sure enough, the skies had opened up and started dumping the rain that they were promising all night.

I stood there for a moment in the door frame, looking at the rain as I rocked back and forth in my tennis shoes, trying to decide if it was just a burst or would continue. The rain showed no signs of reducing in intensity in the gray pre-dawn - in fact, it seemed to increase in intensity as if to mock my thoughts. I sighed, went back inside, and grabbed a cup of coffee instead, contemplating the timing that caused it to rain almost the second I planned to go out, after 1.5 hours of activities inside with no rain at all.

There really are times that one feels the very universe is opposed to one's efforts.

Christmas Rain

December rain's warm,

like the coffee in my hand:

Can this be winter?

Iaido in the Mist

One aspect of New Home that continues to surprise me is the temperature fluctuations. In a one week period, we have probed the depths of the high 20's as well as getting up to later to the low 70's. It is a novelty to me that such swings can occur when one is used to a "fixed" season of the year.

This morning was one of those mornings. I peered out the window and discovered a fog, a mist which had covered the world in damp yet was surprisingly warm. Warmer than it's been in a while in the morning, I grabbed my bokken and headed outside.

I love the world in a fog - more so in a warm fog, as it turns out. The light from streetlights and outdoor lights is diffused, pouring through the gaps in the fence on visible chains of photons. The sound seems muffled as well - not just the quiet of morning, but the deadening of all sound.

The treat for me was the moisture- so much that it dripped as a slow rainfall from the oaks hidden in the foggy half-light.

It was, I decided, perfect Iaido weather.

Assume the position. Migi, Hidari. Hand to tsuba and tsuka as I turn my body and step migi. Saibiki as I pull the saya down from the blade.

And plop! A large drop of moisture lands squarely on my head (the samurai tales never mention that). Shake my head, continue on.

And so I move through the morning mist, drawing and sheathing, cutting and blocking, moving forward and back as the bokken scatters the diffused light and water into invisible waves which make the plunging drops of collected moisture plunge to the ground.

There are times - all too seldom -when in practicing a martial art one reaches the point where not only is one's movement in synch, but the very atmosphere one practices in is equally balanced, where the movement of one's self and the movement of the world around them come together to create an experience which while being simple practice session shines to the very core of the art itself.

Today was such a day.

Clicking

There are moments in life when things just click.

I've learned such moments are random and unplanned. I can't get everything in order, lay out my plans, and then suddenly things just work. I wish I could - it would make things a great deal easier.

It comes at odd times- in the middle of a Saturday, or on a Tuesday at 2:00 PM, or on a Thursday evening. That sense that life is working, that progress is being made.

I wish I knew what created that sense, or what maintains it. I'd like to believe it's planning, or effort - but too often it seems to be neither of those. Instead - and this is the most surprising thing - it literally seems to be something from God. A sense that I am doing what I am supposed to be doing, even if it doesn't always feel like it is the thing I want to be doing.

I wonder if too much of our personal discontentment stems from expectations we put on our lives ("Disillusionment is the child of illusion" - Chip Ingram) and less from the actual circumstances therein.

Like so much else, I'm not sure. All I can say with certainty is that sometimes the less hard I try, the more things seem to work well. At times, one can almost hear the "click" of one part of life sliding in to another.

Sharing Space Again

I seem to be reaching a tipping point of sorts.

I'm finding parts of myself in the last two weeks that I don't believe I've seen in years. This fellow that occasionally speaks out of my mouth and acts with body is not the guy that usually lives in here. He's more decisive, more vocal, more willing to speak up and more willing to act.

I have no idea where this fellow wants to go. I'm not sure he does at this point either - or maybe he does and he's just not telling me about it. He seems to act like he has some kind of plan, or at least some kind of idea what the direction he wants us to go is.

If I had to guess, he's that fellow that lived here some years ago - back in the days when things were for the choosing rather than for the getting along (see yesterday's post). He's certainly much braver than I usually am, more willing to be confrontational if there is an idea or subject worth discussing instead of just sitting back and whimpering about it or stewing after the fact.

I'll be honest - I kind of like him. It's nice to have some company here, especially some company that (for once) doesn't tear down the current inhabitant or make him feel guilty about not doing things or just sigh and feel hopeless along with him. This fellow just picks up and starts going in a direction, dragging the rest of me behind him.

Sometimes we lead ourselves. Sometimes we get led by ourselves. As long as it's forward movement, I'm not sure that it matters.

Calls

I'm starting to get calls from recruiters again. I'm not sure that it's not the end of the year rather than my particular resume or skill set, but coming in they are.

It's a good practice for no other reason than it makes one get into better practice when speaking. It's also good this time around because it is making me more formally evaluate what I really want.

In the past there seems to have been a progression in why I changed jobs: learning new skills (1996-1999), following a mentor (2000-2004), doing my own thing (2004-2005), and then just finding a job to keep the bills paid (2005-present). If I examine that progression (never thought of it that way before), what I see is that my choices in why I do things have gotten less and less - I've chosen less to advance a career than for my own personal reasons (and eating, I suppose, does constitute a personal reason).

One's own personal reasons are not bad things to be sure - but they can interfere with life if there's no master plan behind the choices - and more often than not, that is me.

So as I speak to these people I'm asking the question: what is it that I'm seeking in a position? More money? Sure, that'd be nice. Location? Yes, if it's convenient. But more often than not, I'm talking in terms of career advancement, of what I want to accomplish with and through any new position.

Jim Rohn, a very wise man, once said "The only way things are going to change for you is when you change". It's not the change of job or location or position I'm really seeking, I suppose: it's how I can and will change as I go to that position.

Friend, Manager, Leader

Finding one reason I may have been brought here yesterday.

I am having an internal confrontation in myself between being a friend, a manager, and a leader. One I do very well, one I do passably well, and one I don't do very well at all. It is an issue because it impacts not only my professional life, but my personal life as well.

I realized last week that at the end of December, I will have a manager for 10 years. This is an exceptionally long time to be a manager, especially as I have moved from company to company several times. Originally I came up with other reasons, like it was different bosses, or I came out of the industry and in, or that I came to a new portion of the industry. But in considering it, I have begun to wonder if it is not if fact something within me that keeps me here.

Not that I want to be something beyond a manager necessarily (yes, it's inevitably more money) for the title, but I am realizing that I want more of the personal development that inevitably goes along with it. A leader or manager - a good one, anyway - has skill sets which are valuable in every walk of life, not just in the working world.

And so I sit, looking at the walls that I have become pressed up against and am unable to get through. I intuitively understand that I have reached this limit and that I need to go through the wall, but I do not see the mechanism that I can use to get over, under or around it.

The other issue I need to confront - the one that weighs heavily on me - is the changes that will inevitably occur.

I have a need to be liked. On the one hand, it's a great tool for friendship and certain managerial and departmental relationships - after all, a pleasant person is always better to deal with, and people pleasers will go long lengths to be pleasant. On the other hand, one becomes handicapped into making certain decisions by the fact one is not dealing with reports or employees but friends. As well, if one simply starts changing it creates issues with the ones around you, who do not always understand or appreciate the change and so react as it has upset the relational applecart.

And so I seem to sit here at this precipice, hanging over the edge of doing and becoming. realizing that action must be taken if I am to grow, but shying away from the actions and all the consequences they entail.

Christmas and Revelation

Every year at this time, I read about the end - at the beginning.

If you'll flip to your "Read Through the Bible in A Year" section in the back of your text, you'll find that the month of December is largely taken up by the book of Revelation (no surprise, it is the last book in the Bible). Every year for last 5 years at least, I've found myself here at Christmas.

I realized this morning as I read Revelation 1 that it is an interesting contrast. Here, in the season of the year when we celebrate the advent of Christ, I find myself reading about His return.

The contrasts abound: At His birth, almost no-one recognized His arrival except His parents and some shepherds; in His Second Coming, no-one will be able to help but recognize Him. At His birth He came as a humble peasant child; in His Second Coming He will come in the majesty and glory of the Godhead. At His birth he came powerless; at His Second Coming He comes as the Omnipotent Conquering King of the Universe.

A curious paradox at this time of celebration and mirth, of Christmas trees and carols and eggnog and good cheer.

Surely we should celebrate His coming? Of course - the Coming of Christ, the God-Man who paved the way for the salvation of man, is worthy of remembrance and celebration - not just now, but every day of the year.

But I wonder in our haste to filled with the seasonal spirit if we forget, we betray to the world that our focus is always less than what it should be. We see the First Coming and celebrate; we know the Second Coming is nigh (it's always nearer than it was yesterday), yet we often bury it beneath a weight of eschatalogical words or treat is as the something which is someday coming, but shouldn't concern us now.

We forget - at our peril - that for Israel as well, the Messiah's arrival was something so long in coming that they also eventually failed to look for that which was promised.

Taking Time

I engaged my reading sense this weekend.

On a random splurge at Half Price Books I obtained two books: one Neuromancer by William Gibson, which I hadn't read in many years, the other Shackleton's Way: Leadership Lessons from the Great Antarctic Explorer by Margot Morrell and Stephanie Capparell. It's been a while since I looked to just buying two books for the sheer pleasure of reading.

And read I did. Neuromancer was consumed within 4 hours (including a nap); Shackleton's Way was 2/3's done by the time I left for church on Sunday. I reveled in the opportunity to just sit and drink in good literature.

I compare that with this morning, where I tried to read a bit more of Shackleton's Way as part of my morning reading as I enjoyed it so much. It wasn't the same: I got some reading done, but it seemed I was hurrying so much that I barely had time to enjoy what I was reading, let alone absorb it as I had done the previous day.

The difference surprised me greatly. Same book, same me, but different circumstances in reading. In one, I read purely out of enjoyment with no time frame; in the other, I read in an allocated time frame, seeking to fit something else in an already loaded schedule. The results, both in my sense of enjoyment and my sense of learning, speak for themselves.

This vignette points out to me a core issue in my life: when I try to fit too much in, I scarcely enjoy any of it, whereas if I take the time to focus on what I am doing without a sense of "15 minutes", I derive true joy and learning.

It is not, apparently, that I cannot do many things in short bursts, it's that I cannot do them well or with a sense of gaining anything from them.

When, I wonder, was the time that reading became something I had to do in small bursts, rather than something I could do over longer periods of concentration?

Missing Christmas

Probably missing my Christmas Spirit again.

When I was young, it always felt like Christmas took forever to get there - and once it did, I can remember that it had a definite sense about it being a different time of year: the music, the food, the decorations and Christmas tree, the reminders of why we have Christmas at all around me.

Now, December is not only just another month of the year, it's often the worst month of the year. Every project that was not completed suddenly needs to be done in 20 working days. Music gets ploughed under the movement from here to there. Food becomes something you hope someone else is making because you don't have the time, and decorating becomes a chore. It often feels like Christmas has been reduced to a two day event: Christmas Eve and Christmas.

I wish I knew how to effectively address the problem. I don't really: it's not as if I can march into my place of business and say "I'm working only this hard. Projects are not completed: not my fault. It's Christmas, after all. " I suspect the conversation after that would be short, sweet, and involve a cardboard box.

But surely there is something to be done, probably within myself (as it most often is required). If I cannot seem to muster the ability to celebrate Christmas as I should in the midst of life, perhaps the problem lies with what I expect of Christmas and how I view it. Christ is no less real today than He is the other 11 months of the year. The fact I feel I can celebrate His advent less than normal may be an indicator of how much I value Him rather than how much time I feel I a allocated.

Time Prison

I sat down last night (after leaving work late) to review exactly what I have to do at work before the end of the year. By my calculations, I have 250 odd things to accomplish in 20 days. Add to this at least half of that time already has some activity consuming part of all of the day, and you'll begin to understand why I gave a deep sigh when I finished the list.

I'd love to say that the opportunity is there for me to push some of those things off, that somewhere there is some give for me to fall back on. The reality is that I don't think there is. Any backup is called me.

I'm having to start an activity I am not really good at: scheduling each day, every day.

Simply put, now that I have my list I will start checking off what I have to do by the end of the year, figuring days, and saying "on this day, I have to do this and this". And then do that and that - not run off and do other things, not allow myself to be interrupted by others and their tasks, but just keep on and finish what I am doing.

This will be an interesting (if somewhat tiresome) exercise, as I have never tried (or had) to do this level of planning before. I've no idea if it will work or not. I've no idea if I will survive or not.

But if time is the limiting factor, then I need to spend it as carefully as I can - even if that means totally regulating it.