Life Lesson

Despite how conscious of our decisions we are and how well we control our emotions, when things don’t go our way, we can be quick assign blame.

If you find yourself doing this often; it’s worth figuring out how to remove the blame.

Making examples up here, but …

• Don’t ask for an ice cream recommendation, just choose yourself.
• Don’t ask someone to text you a reminder, write one for yourself.
• Don’t leave the deer stand when someone asks you to come home soon, do it when you’re ready.

The more we make the decisions ourselves, the harder it is for us to blame and the better we get at moving on (because no one likes blaming themselves!).

Stay Positive & You Decide

Photo credit

It only takes one person to become inspired. One conversation or idea they share can get us over the slump we’re in and on our creative way.

If we’re working in a silo; If we’re not setting up meetings; if we’re not calling cowrokers to bounce ideas off of; if we’re not putting ourselves out there to interacting with others, how are we supposed to level up?

We might be able to move inch by inch alone, but if we wish to leap with inspiration, it’s worth connecting with another … and another .. and another until we do.

Stay Positive & It Only Takes One Person

Photo credit

The urge is what gets us places.

The pull we feel. The motivation. The energy. It is all meant to be used as fuel to move forward.

And there’s no sense in fighting the urge.

Doing so ends up doing more harm than good because the pain of regret in regard to inaction will outweigh any challenges we face by following an urge in the first place.

If you feel it. Leverage it.

Stay Positive & The Urge Is There For A Purpose

Photo credit

You’re not required to use the phone that you’re marketing.

You don’t need to be a leader of a group to provide advice to one.

You don’t need to do the activity to know how to connect with those who do the activity.

You don’t need to download the software to sell it.

It helps to, certainly, but it’s not necessary.

At least not if you read up on it, study it, interview others about it, and have more empathy than ever before around it.

We can understand a product or service by living vicariously, but we must live it one way or another.

To not do so forfeits trust and credibility, and ultimately makes the work less meaningful and require more effort.

Stay Positive & And Even If You Do It, Still Have Empathy

Photo credit

We can feel prepared for a presentation, a job, a project but it doesn’t always mean we are.

That’s why it’s worth asking yourself if you could teach someone about what you’ve worked on.

What questions might they have? Will you have the answers?

Can you communicate things simply and effectively?

If you can train someone and be confident in their success, then you’re prepared.

And since you know you could, it might be worth just going on to train someone.

Stay Positive & We Rise By Helping Others Rise

Photo credit

It gets much easier to hold a conversation, build empathy and come to a mutual agreement when we understand that every conversation can be placed on a scale of care.

Some conversation topics people may argue about if given the chance, but they don’t really care. Once we see it and understand the lack of care, we can shrug it off and move on.

Other conversations might result in a heated conversation, almost to a boiling point. Once we see that it’s because the person or group cares deeply – and we lend an ear to understand why they care, we can dig in and help out.

A great question to ask when things begin to get tense: “On a scale of 1 to 10, how much do you truly care about this?”

Stay Positive & Equally Important Is To Answer The Question Ourselves

Photo credit

Many a brand are shifting and reshaping their logos to designate social distancing. Audi moved apart its circles. McDonalds split its M. Volkswagen added greater separation between the V and W. And so on.

Some are authentic and some are opportunistic moves and their customers are reacting appropriately.

Which begs the question of when is it an opportunistic move and not an authentic one?

With an easy answer: It’s opportunistic when a brand has always stood still in regard to the meaning behind the change.

A brand that doesn’t talk about, try new things around, and promote beyond the healthy standards, and all the sudden they try making a message about it based on a outside trend – it’s opportunistic.

Which means, if a brand wants to leverage the opportunities in an authentic way, a brand needs to be proactive in many facets and promotional in them all.

It’s the brands that constantly push the edges of their business (all edges), that can be authentic no matter the trend they are leveraging.

Stay Positive & A Tall Order, But A Meaningful One

Photo credit