MIND THE GAP… … is good advice: If you’re prone to saying things you regret. If you’re feeling snappy. When you’re under pressure. Most of the time. As we learn to mind the gap – first to see it as it whistles by; then to squeeze in a tiny breath and moderate our response; and then (in time) to pause…
Tag: relationships
On any given day, it’s quite possible that you’ll wonder if this is the thing you should be doing. You might be bored, or aimless. You might be stressed and struggling. Something else might look easier or more attractive: more lucrative, more fun, more popular. Any and all of these feelings are quite possible on any given day – which…
… is great when you’re working on your own, bashing through emails or making something. It’s less good when you’re making important decisions, working with groups of people or dealing with situations that require listening, sensitivity and thoughtfulness. Whether it’s caffeine or adrenaline, try to buzz at the right times… Or to do the right kind of work when you…
If you’re building skills, assets and relationships, making a generous contribution, doing work that matters for people who care… You should expect to get better with age. The longer you’ve been working the larger, more influential and more connected your body of work becomes. The faster the world changes, the more valuable your longer term perspective. The faster people come…
This post is part of the working draft of the DriverlessCrocodile Toolkit (read more here). I’d love comments, links to resources related to the theme, and original contributions. Values The best exercise I know for thinking about you values comes from Stephen Covey. If you haven’t done this before, it’s worth taking his advice and taking a few minutes over…
If you’re interested in how ideas, behaviours or prosperity spread through groups of people, this is talk at Google is worth a watch. Recommend.
The idea is really just this: time on a watch is not the same as time in your head. An hour can fly by or seemingly drag for eternity. Time as we actually experience it, rather than as we measure it, is subjective. We all know this intuitively, and our culture has idioms for it (“time flies when…”) but it’s…
This is a different kind of friction: the uncertainty, delay and discomfort that comes from lack of trust or understanding. Like bureaucratic or procedural friction, emotional friction slows us down and makes things more difficult than they need to be. It takes many guises: The extra time we spend second-guessing and explaining ourselves because we’re worried someone will take what…
Making prominence your aim is like building a skyscraper without laying foundations: you might make something tall, but it’s unlikely to last and it will almost certainly cause damage when it collapses. Rather than trying to stick out from the landscape on your own, far better to aim at lifting those around you and be happily surprised if you end…
Some ideas for strengthening your connections within a group of people or scene: Have good, generous intentions. Show up to serve or share where it’s needed and wanted and because being part of this network is its own reward (you like the people, you like what they do), rather than for what you might get out of it. Start small…