There has been the occasional day when no one does. There is a big fat zero in the metrics for that day.
Who am I when nobody reads?
The Best Days…
It still happens from time to time, but not as much as it used to. My 4 year old, sitting on my lap, consuming the food that I have just prepared for myself – often after not eating her food. I used to find it really annoying, especially when food would somehow end up on my suit pants, requiring a change, or when she was supposed to be in bed, asleep.
It wasn’t until it struck me that this is a seasonal part of life, that I began to enjoy it. She certainly won’t be doing it in 10 years, nor 5, probably not in 1. I realised that I had this moment, and this moment only.
Recognising the current season you are in is a significant act of generosity to yourself. You don’t have to beat yourself up for not doing more, for not creating more, for not achieving more, for not…you get the idea. Because right now, in this moment, in this season, you are enough, and you are doing enough. And it is likely that this season will pass, perhaps all too quickly.
20 years from now, my boss is never going to say “remember that time when you attended that meeting?”. It is more likely that my kids will say, “remember that time when we did/saw/went to that thing/place?” That helps me refine my focus on to what is truly important.
But, I admit, managing the tension between this moment right now and the drive to grow and improve and do more, is a challenge.
Am I really that bad?
My nephew* is great. How he engages with my younger kids is remarkable, even though they are about 10 years younger than him. He finds the time and energy to play with them. Not bad for a teenager.
My wife was commenting on this the other day and I agreed, saying that “I never would have done that at his age. I wouldn’t have thought about others the way he does. I probably still don’t.”
Without hesitation, without a second thought, without any internal debate, my wife responded, “Yeah.” Fully agreeing with my self-assessment. It was said with a smile, with a some humour to it, but behind the humour was the subliminal message which said, “but seriously, you don’t”.
Brutal.
It sent me on a bit of a downward spiral. I know I’m not great sometimes but am I really that bad?
I think of other people, don’t I?
I know that I am self-centred, it’s something that I have wrestled with for a long time, and something that I am sure that I will wrestle with for a long time to come. I used to operate from a place of being so afraid of letting people down, or falling short of people’s expectations that I would avoid any sense of responsibility in life. I didn’t want to promise to do something and then not do what I said I was going to. Under promise and over deliver. Or never promise and never deliver. I was a little like Eleanor Shellstrop from the Good Place, “You don’t owe me anything, I don’t owe you anything.”
I thought I had changed my ways. I thought I was a better person than I used to be. I probably am, but here is what I realised after the humorous/serious “Yeah.”:
There is a difference between thinking about others, and then verbalising and acting on those thoughts.
It appears I still have some work to do to shift my thinking into action.
*I have many nephews and nieces; they are all great. This story just so happens to be about one of them.
“Pretty disappointing actually”.
I valued the honesty, but it certainly wasn’t the response that I was expecting.
I had arranged one of our team to participate in a call with a supporter to help them feel connected to what they were giving to. I was on leave at the time and afterwards, I called up to see how it went and the above response is the exact quote that I received in reply.
It was rough.
After a moment I said, “tell me many things about that.”
He shared openly about the experience and it turns out there were a couple of unmet expectations on behalf of all parties involved.
I was shattered. I realised that I didn’t communicate clearly enough with the people and essentially set the meeting up for failure. I had had missed the mark.
Fortunately the supporter was incredibly gracious and understood the challenges, and was generous enough to be open and honest about their experience. I appreciated that greatly and it helped me see that sometimes things are not as easy as we think they will be. I thought I could just connect people via a calendar invite and it will all just work out. Apparently not.
Mostly though, what it taught me is that critical feedback is not fatal, in fact it can be a great source of learning and growth if we let it.
Maybe something happened to her
“Saturday night is probably not the best night to go for a run on that route”.
That was the first thing I said to my wife after I returned from an evening run. I felt a little cooped up during the day and thought that a brief run would help me feel a bit better. What I didn’t take into account was the day of the week nor the time of the day. When it’s night, I will run where there is enough light to do so safely, and this just to happens to take me past the local tavern.
As I approached it this particular night I noticed an older woman leaving it and walking the same direction that I was headed, she was noticeable swaying as she went. I gave her a wide berth as I passed her on the footpath and then stopped to let a car leave the car park, before jogging off again. My new headphones have noise cancellation, which I am loving, but I could still hear someone calling out. I assumed it was coming from the car that just left, but the sound stayed as the car got further away. Finally, I looked behind me and the swaying woman was chasing after me, screaming. I thought she may be in trouble, so I stopped to see what was wrong.
“I’m not going to let you walk past my complex. I am barring you from walking past my complex!” She yelled as she walked past me in an attempt to block my path, continuing her barrage, complete with excess saliva.
“It’s a footpath, I’m just going for a run” I said, but it was not use, she would have none of it and was committed to stopping me in my tracks. Realising that it was no use to engage, I said “I’m going now” and slipped past her to continue on my way and the noise cancellation covered the screams and yells as I left her behind.
My path was a loop and brought me back around to that exact spot a few minutes later and I was a little wary and a tiny bit jumpy when I came back but she was nowhere to be seen. Hopefully she made it safely back to her complex, maybe watching me with wary eyes. Maybe passed out from consuming too much of whatever she had.
The following day I was talking to a friend about this interaction and my seven year old listened in and asked a few questions. (My patience for my seven year olds questions when I am talking with another adult can be a little thin, but I still talked with him about it.)
7yo: “What did she want from you daddy?”
Me: “She wanted me to stay away from her home, even though I was on the footpath where everyone is allowed to be”
7yo: “Why did she do that daddy?”
Me: “Well, I think she may have had too much alcohol and thought I was someone else.”
7yo: “Maybe something happened to her.”
And there it was. The most profound, generous and thoughtful response I had heard for a while. And most likely true. I don’t know the trauma or pain that this women had experienced. I don’t know what life had dished up for her, but it is likely that there was something troubling that was going on for her in that moment.
I hope that my seven year old will take that mentality with him for the rest of his life, to look past people’s behaviour and see the hurt that is motivating that behaviour. Because really, everyone has had something happen to them, and being able to recognise that, whilst is doesn’t excuse how people behave, and try to understand it even a little bit, is a great act of generosity.
It’s easy to judge. It’s generous to try and understand.
2024 – The Year of Sweetness (because ‘sweet spot’ sounds a little weird for some reason)
I can’t remember who said it late last year, but in a conversation with someone they used the term ‘sweet spot’ in regards to their work. Immediately it resonated and I knew that was something I wanted to focus on too.
I do a lot of different things in life, work, family and extra curricular activities. Some things I do just because I did them last year, and the year before and they become part of my routine. Looking for my sweet spot in different areas has helped me think about the things that I can let go of. Things that are good, I don’t mind them, they don’t create a negative effect, but they are not great. Whether that’s reducing the content I create, the amount of events I attend or create, or meetings that I say yes to.
And if I say no to them this year, it leaves me with more time to spend doing the things that are great, that I love and that are right in my sweet spot.
In a practical, non-work sense, this looks like focusing on shorter distances with my running and not the longer ones. Sure, I can run a reasonable 5km, but it’s not great and it takes energy away from the 100m, which I love.
Sweet spot. Sweet spot. The more I say it the weirder it sounds. I can only imagine that spending 2024 using that as my theme it will get on my nerves, so I have landed on ‘sweetness’ as my word for the year. Sure it’s a bit “Dude, where’s my car”, but that aside I enjoy the idea of seeking out the sweetness of life.
Top 5 Books from 2023
Looking back at my reading over the last 12 months I notice that it was a very fiction heavy year. Perhaps a little embarrassingly so – as much of the fiction was what I call my ‘junk food’ reading. But, here we are, overweight with murder solving stories from L.A. Outside of that, there is the embarrassment of discovering books that have been around for a couple of decades. I can be a little slow when it comes to finding good books, but it’s nice that they still hold up.
Here are some incredible highlights:
Man’s Search for Meaning – The Classic Tribute to Hope from the Holocaust, Viktor Frankl
A re-read. I keep hearing so many people talk about this book as a significant one in their lives and no matter how many times I read it, it still moves me. I come out with something different each time. The quote that has stuck with me this year is, “Happiness cannot be pursued. It must ensue. One must have a reason to be happy.”
Chasing happiness as an ends in itself will not work.
A second stand out quote:
“Man does not simply exist but always decides what his existence will be, what he will become in the next moment”.
We are not set in concrete. We get to choose what our existence will be.
If you have not read this book, read it. I have a copy that I can lend to you (I’ll need it back to read it again).
Blink – The Power of Thinking Without Thinking, Malcolm Gladwell
Sure, it’s been out for almost 20 years, but it was one of Gladwell’s books that I had never found my way to, until this year. There were a lot of illustrations about the way we can utilise the initial response we have in given moments. The one thing that I still find myself thinking about is the section on micro expressions, and how our expressions can change the way we feel. So I’ve been trying to smile more…
Fooled by Randomness – The Hidden Role of Chance in Life and in the Markets, Nicholas Nassim Taleb
Published in 2001 and still totally accurate, also probably the only book that I have read by Taleb that I mostly understood.
By sheer weight of numbers and chance, some people are lucky for a period of time (in both life and markets). Often they then believe that their ‘method’ is the reason for their success, but then their luck runs out and they implode. If you give luck enough time, it will run out. This book highlights that just because something seems to have worked for you, that doesn’t make it the best method or even an effective method. Also, just because something hasn’t happened before, it doesn’t mean that it won’t happen in the future. Again, this book was written before the Great Recession, Donald Trump’s Presidency and COVID.
The Obstacle is the Way – Ryan Holiday
Another re-read and a great way to end the year. It is always a constant reminder that we will face obstacles in life, that is a guarantee, but our response to those obstacles shapes what our life looks like. It comes down to how we perceive the obstacle, the action we take and the will we have to keep going.
Fiction of the Year
Station Eleven – Emily St John Mandel
I don’t even remember how this book got on my list, but I’m so glad it did. It was an incredibly compelling story, flitting back and forth through time to share the characters’ journeys into a new world after a virus wipes out most of the global population (first published in 2014). I loved it and would read it again. It has also been made into a miniseries on one of the streaming services. That was okay (but they are never as good).
Other books read:
Wolf of the Plains: The Epic Story of the Khan Dynasty – Conn Iggulden (Very good read)
The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry – Jon Mark Comer
Originals – Adam Grant
The Lincoln Highway – Amor Towles
The Course of Love – Alain de Botton
The Screwtape Letters – C S Lewis
The Secret – Lee Child
And then many Michael Connelly books…
A Darkness More than Light – Michael Connelly
Lost Light – Michael Connelly
The Narrows – Michael Connelly
The Closers – Michael Connelly
Echo Park – Michael Connelly
The Overlook – Michael Connelly
Nine Dragons – Michael Connelly
The Drop – Michael Connelly
The Black Box – Michael Connelly
The Burning Room – Michael Connelly
The Crossing – Michael Connelly
The Wrong Side of Goodbye – Michael Connelly
Two Kinds of Truth – Michael Connelly
Dark Sacred Night – Michael Connelly
The Night Fire – Michael Connelly
The Dark Hours – Michael Connelly
Desert Star – Michael Connelly
The Late Show – Michael Connelly
Tyred of the same thing?
Christmas is upon us. It’s nearly here. It’s happening.
As you go about your preparation for this season and think about the people you will buy presents for, think about what they would really like. I’ve noted before that this is not my strong suit, but I am not the only one.
I recently found out that Australian’s will spend $921 million on presents for people this year that are unwanted. That’s right, almost one billion dollars on gifts that people will throw out. $35 for every man, woman and child will be chucked out. Creating 275,000 tonnes of landfill, about a kilogram for each person.
So, in order to save yourself some time and landfill, reach into your wallet or purse, grab $35 and throw it in the bin.
Or, buy something that will do some good, ensure that your money gets used, recycled and used again, and see to it that your gift is recyclable, by purchasing a Gift of Opportunity. These gifts, like chicks, or ducks, or seeds, or old tyres (yep you read that right), represent things that women living in poverty in India and Indonesia use to create their own business from a small loan. Through that business they make an income, put food on the table, send their kids to school, pay the loan back and work their way out of poverty. Your Christmas gift this year is you providing that loan on behalf of someone you care about and letting them know about it. It’s feel good, do good, save the planet gift giving.
Merry Christmas!
Hurting people hurt people
The hardest thing for me to do is to looking past someone’s outward behaviours to see the motivations of their behaviours. Everyone acts in a way that makes sense to them at some level. For those that commit acts of violence or aggression or seek to tear people down, mostly what motivates those actions is pain, hurt and trauma. Sure, some people are psychopaths, but most people are just in pain. That doesn’t excuse their behaviour, nor should it inoculate them from the consequences of their bahaviour, but it does give insight as the reason why. Once we can see the hurt, pain and trauma, then we can attempt to heal those parts and, hopefully, bring an end to violent acts and aggression, at least in that person.
You see, hurting people hurt people. If you have been hurt in your life (and who hasn’t?), it is likely that you are hurting those people closest to you, without even realising it. It is almost a guarantee, unless…
Unless you have done the work of healing, unless you have access to gratitude, unless you have been generous to yourself.
Being generous to yourself helps you heal from the hurt, hurt people less and gain superpowers to not be as hurt by other hurting people.
Hurt, pain and trauma is a big fat mess, but generosity can be starting point to bring some healing to you and those around you.
Giving = Living
There were these beautiful moments where people would visit Morrie Schwartz to offer him support and assistance, but in the end, they would leave being encouraged, uplifted and loved by him.
He was dying. And what would normally have been a time of sorrow and despair became a time of hope and joy. Such was the impact that he had on the people around him. Such was his generosity.
When asked why he chose to focus this time on those who came to see him, and to build them up, he answered “Taking makes me feel like I’m dying, giving makes me feel like I’m living.”*
Even though he was dying, he didn’t feel like he was because his was giving to other people. That is the power of generosity that even in the face of death it brings life and life to the full.
If you want to feel like you are living, no matter what is happening around you, giving to others is the best thing you can do.
*Tuesday’s with Morrie by Mitch Albom
Forget You
“The more one forgets himself — by giving himself to a cause to serve or another person to love — the more human he is and the more he actualizes himself.” Viktor Frankl.
I hate serving. I hate the idea of being a servant. The word conjures images of people living as slaves and waiting on someone hand and foot because they have no other option. Servitude sucks.
The fact that we have an industry called, ‘the service industry’ irks me. I even used to work in it for a bit (I wasn’t great). To be clear, it’s not the industry that I don’t like, but the name. I bristle at the idea of being in someone else’s control, at their beck and call and having no agency of my own.
But this is not what service is, nor the service industry. One of the main differences is perspective, and shifting my thinking from service being slavery, to a picture of a person working for a greater cause. This creates a different experience. That is the only way that I can comfortably land in a place where I can positively talk about serving another person, as a way of forgetting myself and working towards something bigger. Putting someone else’s needs before mine. (They say that marriage and parenthood offer that sort of experience, but I have seen plenty of married people and parents live out of selfishness, and I have done that many times myself).
When Viktor Frankl talks about being more human when we forget ourselves, he is talking about the emotional experience. When we actively care for someone else, when we are seeking their benefit at the cost of our own, then we are having a greater human experience. Jesus talked about gaining your life only after losing it. There is something special that comes when we give of ourselves, when we sacrifice for others, when we serve. That is the beautiful gift that generosity brings. When we act in a way that puts others in the central part of our life, then we receive the benefit of the generous experience. You can’t stop it, it just happens naturally.
Real slavery does exist in our world, and it is evil. But the kind of service that Viktor Frankl refers to is not that. It is the opposite, it is the freedom to give of yourself to someone else and finding that you gain something amazing in the process.
The Generosity Guy 