Expressing yourself

I still remember when I used to take care of my little sister, who was a few months-old. I was a young man, studying in a military school and I went back home for vacation – taking care of your little sister was not part of my plan…

It was a very interesting time and one of my challenges was to understand what she wanted. Many times, she looked wiser than me – when she tried to sleep as early as 6 pm, so I could have at least a free night. Although she couldn’t speak and her emotions were very raw, her expression was clear enough.

Nowadays, the challenge is different of course, but it has some common elements with this example. As most of the communication a person have happens without seeing other people, via email or WhatsApp, the paradigm of expressing the self is changing very quickly.

Even letting aside the written language and the fact u is replacing you, I am expressing myself through the way I use the words, the way the ideas flow and transform themselves into a message, sent to millions, in many cases.

In fact, what is happening is that subtly, part of a person goes along with his message. Vibrations? Maybe… But that is something to take in account by leaders in the whole world. Two interesting examples of good expression using subtle aspects:

• Jill Bolte Taylor is an American scientist who described her own experience with a brain stroke in the book My stroke of Insight. At a point in her book, she described her mother’s effort in her recovery; after receiving many good wishes cards, her mother posted them in her apartment’s wall, on her way. Although Jill couldn’t see the cards or read them, she could feel the vibration of love coming from it.
• Antanas Mockus is a Colombian expert in pedagogy. Many of us still remember the cards he made up to teach people how to drive in a more conscious way. His new campaign is to help drivers to understand the laws of coexistence, in terms of traffic particularly in intersections. Through images and other tools, he hopes to help drivers to have a better experience, and create a better city.

Check your communication style for the subtle and invisible elements there. Maybe, they are the one that will boost your capacity of expression.

Productivity does not mean to work more...

At times of crisis this formula is common: work more!

However, productivity is not measure by quantity, but by the quality of that quantity. For instance, if work ten hours and are able to produce the equivalent of US$ 1,000, you are still less productive than if you would work 5 hours and you would be able to produce the equivalent of US$ 550.

During a crisis period, it is very difficult to focus on quality: people don’t study more, they don’t take care of their health more and they have worries in their minds all the time. And yet, it is during a crisis period you should study more, take care of your health more than ever and never, I repeat, never worry – because you need all that energy to be used on coming out of that same crisis.

The same rule applies to all phases of change: quality, instead of quantity. It implies a very strict discipline over one’s mind, a clear vision of the future and a deep leadership.

The belief behind it is that by investing in quality, quantity eventually will come, your investment – any resource you apply to it – will pay off and you will be able to reinvest. If you invest in quantity, your investment eventually will wear off.

So, if you are working too much the suggestion is to look for those skills you already have that can give you a better quality in return. Invest any energy you have on those and see how they grow. Eventually, they will give you the quantity you need for less time of effort. 

Happiness lies in deep acceptance

Former prime-minister Cameron, from United Kingdom, thought at some point to take happiness inconsideration as an economical factor. It would be interesting if that wonderful quality jumped from being just something people like to have to that thing people MUST have.

I feel happiness is so deep nobody can really track it efficiently. Why is that?

First reason is the fact people mix different feelings and emotions. What is the difference of happiness and joy? When you are drinking with co-workers, is that happiness? That video on little cats that made you laugh… is that happiness? If your son is very sick and needs your encouragement, what feeling will come to your mind? Happiness? Knowledge of what happiness is would be a first step to consider, in case someone really wants the happiness factor in their community.

Second reason is the fact most people consider happiness as something coming from outside, instead of emerging from inside. People often looks for happiness in a new car, a different spouse or a better remunerated job, and of course they lose it when the car is not new anymore, the different spouse behaves exactly as the former one and this job is so stressing…

But it is the third reason that makes me thinking on how to make people happier. Acceptance: happiness cannot be attained if true acceptance does not happen. Not talking here about resignation or submission, but true and real acceptance, that sensation when the person understands what is going on, with no struggle, but a feeling of something is right about this.

Everything that occurs in life may be a curse or a blessing, and it depends of the person’s perspective. If there is real acceptance, it is possible to use circumstances as leverage for a higher jump.

When acceptance is present in the heart, the individual can start to enjoy happiness despite the situation: if it is bad, it is a lesson that will help him or her in the future; if it is good, it is time to help others to have it too.

Until real acceptance is attained, real happiness will be difficult to be experienced.

The art of getting feedback from others

One of the easy ways to improve your life is to learn from others’ experiences and lessons. For that, you can just watch them and try your best replicating whatever you see, listen or understand. Or, you can let others say what they think.

As children, we learn from our mistakes. A lot: we raise and fall, and we learn we shouldn’t fall; we go and play with a dog that bites us, and we learn we shouldn’t pull its tail, or we arrive late for lunch and mommy gives us cold food, teaching us to arrive punctually. Of course, the love we receive and the unconditional forgiveness for every mistake compensates any bad situation.

As adults however things are not that simple: we often don’t learn from our falls, we keep on pulling another dog’s tail and our punctuality does not improve. It seems adults don’t learn at all, at least not as a child would do. We learn differently and there are many theories about that, but I would like to talk about feedback, which means others telling you what to do.

I consider an art to be able to get feedback from others. When there is an opportunity to improve – in other words, we did badly – what we hear is complaints or accusations; to turn those into a positive experience and help the self to improve is a hard work for the listener rather than the speaker.

It is useful to separate whatever others speak in categories. A typical example is when someone indicates about your lack of punctuality; put aside their anger or the fact they are upset by that. Then, focus on the need of the other person, ask yourself: How can I be more punctual?, and listen to their advice.

Second step is your own reflection on whether you implement that feedback. Maybe you simply can’t; if that is so, just talk and explain that to the other person. If you can, make a plan to turn it into reality. In case you need to talk to the other person, look for an agreement that makes them happy with your own situation.

The third step comes when you yourself ask for feedback, checking if everything is alright after making some experiments.

Feedback is a cyclic process… after the third step, go back to the first and start all over again, which guarantee you will have a very interesting and dynamic life.

Win and win...

One of the biggest changes in terms of civilization paradigm – and it is still going on – it is one of the least perceived, and it could comprised in the change of just one word: from OR we are coming to AND.

Now, now, we are not talking about math here, but common use of these words. When I say I will be working today or tomorrow that means it is one of these two days, not both.

OR worked powerfully for centuries and it was expressed in many ways like I will be a lawyer or a doctor, I will be supporting this political party or the other one, I am either a Christian or a Muslim.

AND is the new model and it can be expressed in different ways: I will be a lawyer specialized in medicine, I will be supporting any person whose values are aligned to mine, I understand and embrace all religions.

In relationships and any negotiation there is another effect: you want all sides to win.

During the OR paradigm, winners were only that because of the losers; with AND paradigm, there are no winners if there are losers, and of course there are no losers when all win.

It is probably a little harder; it will take much more time than just go and win over the other and declare your domain. But in a life we all know it is a long journey, that time you spend reaching a consensus will be rewarded in a big way.

When to stop is a good thing

In a world in a rush, to stop does not look good.

In terms of your career, part of your success relies on you working as much as possible and as hard as possible. If you stop at some point, people will forget about you and to resume your activities maybe is not that easy.

So don’t stop… however, how much your body, mind and soul can resist? There is a point we all break, when we cannot do anything else and, of course, we stop…

And that is the real stop everyone fears. It is the stop after which you won’t be able to do much. It is the stop that takes you into retirement, sometimes an early one, or makes you to leave whatever you were doing.

But retirement is not supposed to be like that. On the contrary, it just means a period of your life when you have more time to enjoy life or, like in the old Indian culture, you can go and dedicate yourself fully to a spiritual path. In other cultures, retired people became leaders and the wise guides of their communities.

Retirement really means to be able to go beyond the basic and general needs and be in a state which anything you do is for your own comfort or pleasure. The problem is if that stage is fruit of extreme tiredness or any other reason through which you had to stop, then you won’t take advantage of that important part of life. 

A simple solution is to stop from now and then, taking sometime free for yourself to reflect and relax, to go deep into your life and give others much of the inner treasures they have accumulated along their valuable life…. But not in the end! Right now!

You can meditate or just sit surrounded by your family and friends. You can just use the red traffic light to have a moment for yourself and think of peace, or you may go into a retreat every year and take that time to set yourself into an improvement path.

This is the type of stop that is good, very good.

How to change your behavior?

Can you stop eating your nails? Hummm… I knew you would act just like that! Did you lose your job again? Can’t you make something about the way you treat other people?

When people want you to change, that means your behavior. However, it is not that easy as you probably already know.

Behavior is influenced by the way we think and see the world, which may be called attitude and awareness. So, if you are able to change any behavioral feature but you did not change your attitude and awareness, that will come back when you less expect.

For instance, if you are able to stay at a job longer than normally, that is something to celebrate. However, part of the reason you used to lose your job was your bad temper and it happens in this job each person is nice; what will happen when your boss hires someone who starts to upset you then?

The inner concept you have about yourself tells you something like this: whenever someone starts to create problems for you, just move away from that person. That means your time in this job is limited by those circumstances; when you change your awareness, you will be able to keep any job.

This is why this idea of quick change or 21 days to get rid of a habit is a myth if you don’t change those invisible aspects along with those nasty habits.

How to change the way you think? How to change who you are? That means deep reflection and inner work; it means you need a method that helps you with that too.

In my experience, the easiest part is attitude and there is a basic 3-step process that may help a person to do that:

1. Identify. First of all you have to understand your attitude; it works as a template for your thoughts so that when you react to situations or you start to reflect on something, those thoughts will work a pattern. Identifying and understanding the pattern is the first stage of a personal change. OK, I have the tendency of being pessimistic…
2. Check and change. During sometime – ok, it can be 21 days… – you will be your own observer. You may use some tools like meditation or a journal, but the main important point is to be aware of those patterns; whenever a bad attitude emerges, stop a few seconds or minutes and review it, replacing it with the thoughts or ideas you would like to have instead. I think I will lose this job… Wait a second! Why am I even thinking like this? I will work with quality and intensity, and I will prepare myself better by studying and researching, improving that quality.
3. Dare. After a while, you will feel things have changed and bad patterns are not emerging as much as before, or have completely disappeared. That is the point when you have to challenge yourself and get into a situation where you will test your ability, see what happens with you and go back to the first stage of this process. I will go and talk to my boss, seeing if there is the possibility of losing my job, but I will do that from a positive point of view, knowing how capable I am.

With your awareness, it is a similar process, but deeper and subtler. Meditation is probably the best tool when you feel it is not enough to change attitudes, and the reason is that by meditating, you have another perspective of who you are, beyond all labels you have tagged in yourself; so, you can identify that you want to change, being an observer and eventually, challenge yourself to see if the change really happened.

When both have changed you will feel a behavioral transformation. Even if one of those – attitude and awareness – has changed, you will feel some level of transformation.