As much as I write that life can be more simple, we people can be complex.The stories we tell ourselves about our life are beautiful, rich, and complicated. The feelings we feel when things just don’t right - those feelings are bright, vivid, and intense.Experiencing the energy of other people can be draining. If you are the kind of person easily drained by the emotions of others, it’s okay.Give yourself time and space to say - “it’s okay, that’s a part of serving others.”

“The reason it is hard to end things well is simple: endings inspire overpowering emotions.” - Robert Greene, 33 Strategies of WarAt the end of a concert after the big crescendo and the final hit the theater will go to black. The theater will go dark just for a moment and then the lights come back up. In that space is the overpower response to musician’s art. During a sales presentation the consultant often pauses before they deliver their call to action. They share the struggles of other clients, how hard it is to do business, and how they hear so many people asking for a solution - and then they pause. They say, “and that’s why we made this…”Books have chapters, cartoons have “that’s all folks,” letters have “Sincerely,” and our lives have death. What I struggle to understand is this: If the end of things brings forth overpowering emotion, why would we deny ourselves that experience? Wouldn’t we look forward to the end? Perhaps we don’t fear the end. Perhaps we might regret that we didn’t take full enough advantage of the present. There’s no refund policy on time spent. Make the most of the present, and look forward to the overpowering rapture of the end. Fine.

Status quo bias is real, and you live with it. The reason you can’t make changes in your life, the reason that people aren’t influenced by your great offers, the reason why nothing changes - status quo bias; the preference to keep things just as they are. Understand: People maintain their status quo because they believe life is good just as it is. The decisions they are making now are the right decisions for them. Put another way, people don’t want to believe they make bad decisions for themselves. To get them to change we must:Reinforce the status quo. You make great decisions, things are going great for you, look at how far you’ve come, all of the time and effort you invested to get to this outcome… you are killing it. (this only works if you believe what you are saying) Ask a provocative question. What if you could get something more…? Why are you leaving money on the table? How might you take what you know works and take more advantage of it? (This only works if you believe the question will help the person)Be silent. Wait. Art is in the response; let the person you are trying to persuade sit with your question. (This always works - we can afford to talk less)If you want to inspire change, then a good first step is to reinforce the status quo, be curious, and be still.

As Robert Burns writes in To a Mouse, “The best laid plans of mice and men” often go ugly; and they do.You and I plan poorly. We create objectives, we create tasks to hit our objectives, we plan to reflect on our work and improve; but do we truly ever? When Nature hurls chaos upon us, we often don’t know how to respond. We ask, How can this happen - all my best laid plans! In that moment of doubt, when our best laid plans “gang aft agly”, we need to become water.Spend time in nature - especially near a creek. Watch how water effortlessly moves across and around obstacles. Let the sounds of water churning and swirling around rocks to enchant you. Think to yourself, how might I be more like water? How might my life go from being a hurricane to a soft churn and swirl as I move effortlessly around rocks and creek bends? When our best laid plans go ugly and chaos reigns, effortlessly moving around that which gets in our way - like water - is the surest antidote to the stress caused by a fixed and vexed mind.

As your army faces the enemy and the enemy appears powerful, try to attack the enemy in one particular spot. If you are successful in crumbling that one particular spot, leave that spot and attack the next, and so on and so forth, as if you were going down a winding road.” - Myamoto Musashi (1584 - 1645)Myamoto understood productivity and how to get things done. Break the problem into its smallest parts. Then attack the first task.Once you’ve tackled that particular task, go on to the next, and “so on and so forth, as if you were going down a winding road.”

I bought a bag of flour from a local mill. I struggled to open the bag as it had been knitted and knotted tightly. At first, I started to disassemble the knots one at a time. I spent so many minutes figuring out how the string was tied - was it worth it?Then I took a knife to the bag and cut the knots in half. The bag opened effortlessly. What if the complexities life was like a knot and our mind the knife? What if we could cut the knot in half and let it effortlessly unravel? Stop wasting your time.Cut the knot.

“An eagle had perched on the crest of a craggy rock to scan the ground below for hares. Am an shot him with an arrow, which lodged in his flesh. The end of the arrow, feathered with eagle’s feathers, stuck out of him and stared him in the face. Seeing it, he cried out: “‘This is the crowning insult, to die because of the danger I myself presented.’” - Aseop’s Fables, #7: The Eagle Hit by an ArrowHow often are you beat at your game by yourself? Do you make your suffering worse on your own? Too often we are the eagle pierced with an arrow of our own making. What we say and do to ourselves doesn’t need to be so harsh.

If you want to learn how to ride a bike, you will fall… a few times.Eventually you find your balance.In any endeavor, be prepared to fall a few times on your way to finding balance.

Have you read this post about anxiety from February of last year?I experienced that feeling the other day. One way I got myself out of it was to remember the mosaic. To step back from the mosaic and see how beautiful it looks. When we feel ourselves valueless or overwhelmed, its best to step back and get perspective. 95% of my work as a manager involves helping people pause, still their mind, and find perspective. Rome wasn’t built in a day, and it’s likely not burning.We’re going to be okay.

“Before anything else you must lose your fear - of death, of the consequences of a bold maneuver, of other people’s opinion of you. That single moment will suddenly open up vistas of possibilities.” - Robert Greene, The 33 Strategies of WarHow many possibilities do we deny ourselves to our fear? How many more will need to slip through our fingers before we start demanding the best for and of ourselves? What is the cost of inaction?