Tag Archives: personal reflections

Toothy wisdom

All articles,

When my mother was about 60 years old, her dentist advised her to stop cracking nuts open with her teeth.  She had not, until that time, had any fillings.

I was reminded of this this week when, in the midst of a week that was already far too busy, I fell victim to a dental emergency.  Was it the crunchy carrot stick?  I’m not sure, but in the midst of my lunch, something crunched and it wasn’t what was intended – a significant chunk of enamel fell away from the side of a very old filling.  Too much information, I know.

Have you ever noticed how, when something changes in your mouth – you chip a tooth or have a new filling – you have an urge to feel it with your tongue?  The cavity left by my lunchtime crunching felt like an enormous seaside cave to me.  It still does – I shall be hot footing it to the dentist this morning.

I find myself wondering:  what other changes in my life have seemed so huge at the time?  Changes that have gone on to become part of my life’s tapestry…  I think of some of the experiences that were so unwelcome at the time and seem so different now.  I think of the way those experience have shaped me and enriched my life.  And I feel grateful.

Right now, ahead of time, I’m feeling grateful for Dr. Lydia Pink at the Blackheath Village Dental Practice.

Integrity – a different form of leadership

Developing as a leader, Emotional Intelligence, , , ,
What counts is for a man to dare to be entirely himself,
standing alone, one single individual alone before God,
alone with that enormous effort and responsibility. 
Søren Kierkegaard
Working with client organisations to create a model of the competencies they wish their staff to demonstrate – that is, the competencies that differentiate high performance – I have noticed over the years how quick commissioning clients are to ask for the inclusion of Integrity.  This competency is concerned with acting in a way which is consistent with what one says is important – some call it congruity.
In practice, though, I find that organisations want this from their employees – up to a point.  Leaders want their employees to speak openly and honestly, for example, as long as the message is one they want to hear.  They welcome employees who act in line with their own values, as long as their values are congruent with the values of the organisation.  Perhaps, even, they want their employees to be open and honest with customers or clients, as long as they still get the deal.
I have been reminded of this in recent days as I reflect on Uwe Timm’s book In My Brother’s Shadow.  Born in Hamburg in 1940, Timm was 16 years younger than his brother and had few memories of the young man who lost his legs, and then his life, as a member of the German Army.  Timm’s book is both an intensely personal memoir of family life during and after the war and an exploration of the difficult questions that surround the Germans’ involvement in World War II.  How is it, for example, that the Germans asked so few questions about their Jewish neighbours as they gradually disappeared from view?  Of his own brother, he wonders how he could speak of the British bombing of Hamburg as inhumane whilst never making the same judgements of the killing of civilians by soldiers in the German army.
Surveying the literature Timm highlights the case (from Wolfram Wette’s book The Wehrmacht) of a German officer who walked down the street in his home town in uniform together with a Jewish friend, at a time when Jews were branded by the Star of David.  The man, who, in this way, demonstrated the highest level of integrity, was dishonourably discharged from the army.  He also highlights, drawing on Christopher Browning’s book Ordinary Men, how few soldiers took the opportunity that was freely given to them to ask to be withdrawn from duties which included killing their Jewish compatriots.
I want to add that I share Timm’s reflections with the clear understanding that we all face challenges when we seek to act with integrity – to make choices in line with our values in the face of increasing levels of personal risk.  In this sense, leadership has nothing to do with the official role in which we find ourselves.  Rather, it has everything to do with our willingness to make considered choices – and to own those choices – in line with our most heartfelt values, knowing that we cannot control the responses of others to the choices we make.  I believe that this remains a challenge for us all.  And I am grateful that I have not yet had to face the level of challenge faced by Germans during World War II and by many around the world today.
Returning to Timm, I note his awareness of the values that fuelled the choices of his parents’ generation including a strong sense of community and of obedience to community values.  It was in adherence to these values that many men, brought to trial after World War II, said:  “I was only obeying orders”.
No wonder, then, that Timm chooses to quote Kierkegaard, as part of his explorations.
PS  Just to let you know, as a member of Amazon Associates UK, I shall receive a referral fee for any books you buy using the links in this posting.

What’s your Monday morning story?

Emotional Intelligence,

Monday morning.  The alarm goes off to signal the beginning of the working week.  As a lover of sleep my first alarm goes off ten minutes before I intend to get up and in this time I take time to come round and to ponder the week ahead.  Almost without exception, I work from home on Mondays, and enjoy my full schedule of coaching by telephone.  So, as much as I love my sleep, I come round to the prospect of a day I am confident I will enjoy.

Over the years, my Monday morning story has been a gauge of the good – or otherwise – health of my working life.  Sometimes, the sinking of my heart as I wake signals a week to which I do not look forward.  Too many Mondays like this and I know it’s time to take stock and ask:  what needs to change?  Sometimes, it has been my understanding that the time has come to change jobs.  Sometimes, I have seen the need for me to change in order that I might open my heart and mind to a greater measure of fulfilment in my work.

The moment of waking on a Monday morning is also a good time to catch my hidden and limiting beliefs.  Do I believe I am deserving of a job I love or do I see it as the fate of man (or of this woman) to experience work as toil, a means to an end?  Do I see myself as the victim or the creator of my working life?  Do I believe I can take action towards my dreams or do I believe they will always be just out of reach and beyond arms’ length?  Do I believe I have what it takes to succeed or do I believe that I shall be forever wanting?  Do I see work as struggle or do I enjoy work as a sense of flow, of synchronicity, an unfolding adventure?

Whatever my early Monday morning thoughts, they are a powerful indicator of the experience that lies ahead, since – unless I catch them with my awareness and make changes to them immediately, or over time – they dictate the nature of my experience during the week ahead.  More than that, they send signals to others who, in turn, are influenced by my thoughts.

I wonder, at this stage in your life, what is your Monday morning story? 

Breathing out before I breathe in

All articles,

Monday evening, 3rd January 2011.  Today is a Bank Holiday in the United Kingdom since New Year’s Day fell on a Saturday.  As I write the bulk of the UK’s working population is preparing for the year’s first day back at work.

I have been preparing, too.  I have a session with a coaching client on the afternoon of my first day back which includes looking at feedback from her colleagues and I have taken time to review the feedback.  I have also been clearing out some of the e-mails which have landed during the holiday.

My preparations have been gentle and slow as I just about make it into first gear.  I am slowly recovering from a cold which I put down to my outbound flight to Copenhagen on Boxing Day (all those shared germs).  Even as I write I also recognise that I was susceptible at this time – the germs came and I said “yes, please come in”, as if my body knew to invite me to rest for a few days and to let everything wait.

As I have done many times before I think of the vocal coach I worked with, alongside my colleagues in the London Symphony Chorus.  Although I struggle to remember her name right now I do remember a key learning I took from our work together and whose application goes way beyond the art and craft of singing:  sometimes you have to breathe out before you breathe in.

Your time is limited, so don’t waste it by living someone else’s life

All articles,
Your time is limited, so don’t waste it by living someone else’s life
Steve Jobs
CEO, Apple

In London, students have been protesting at the proposal to raise the fees for attending university.  As I write, MPs are facing a controversial vote in Parliament which will have been decided by the time this post is published.  In the day’s news and commentary journalists have been highlighting just how many MPs on both sides of the house, in the run-up to the Parliamentary debate, have been undecided which way to vote.
As a country, our need to balance our books is a current driver for this proposal and yet, it seems to me, there are much larger issues at stake.  They are not all negative, so that – even whilst remembering that my own university education was entirely paid for by the state – I am undecided which way to lean.  I am aware, for example, that many of our country’s greatest entrepreneurs did not complete a university education and I wonder if, by inviting students to consider what they want from university and to calculate whether or not they want to make the investment needed to achieve this (financial or other) return-on-investment, we encourage the very entrepreneurialism which our politicians so often say is lacking (even whilst encouraging its surpression by the messages they give about and through education – a whole topic of its own).
It’s not that I am decided on this issue – I am open to look at it from all sides and I am sure that it would take more looking at than I am likely to do to reach an informed and considered conclusion.  I’d like to think that this is what the politicians are doing on my behalf, even whilst recognising the likelihood that more immediate concerns will stand in the way of a much larger picture.
I am, though, sure that – with or without education – we are born with resources which are apt to manifest themselves.  Insofar as education adds value, it does so by supporting us in becoming the person we are meant to become – like the acorn becoming the oak – rather than by seeking to mould us into something we are not.  Everything that I feel most passionate about – education, training, coaching, leadership – has this truth at its heart.
So it was striking to me as I found myself watching, once again, one of the wonderful short talks on http://www.ted.com/, to hear Steve Jobs talk to students graduating from Stanford University about how to live before you die.  Jobs spoke about his own experience of dropping out of university only to spend a further eighteen months dropping in on those lectures that most appealed to him whilst kipping on the floors of his friends and returning Coke bottles in order to get the 5 cent return which would pay for his food.  He talked about how his learning served him in setting up what became Apple.  He talked about being sacked from Apple and, by a quirk of fate, setting up a company that later became part of Apple so that he, one-time CEO of Apple became CEO again.  Jobs could not foresee the outcomes that would come from following his instincts in this somewhat unconventional way and still, they came, and they came from doing what he most enjoyed.
And in the midst of his fascinating talk came the most arresting of his comments which I offer once more for the sheer joy of his insight when he says:  Your time is limited, so don’t waste it by living someone else’s life.
If you were living the life that you – and only you – were born to live, what life would that be?

They shall not grow old, as we that are left grow old

All articles, , ,

They went with songs to the battle, they were young.
Straight of limb, true of eyes, steady and aglow.
They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted,
They fell with their faces to the foe.
They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning,
We will remember them.

Laurence Binyon
From his poem, “The Fallen”
World War I ended officially at 11am on 11th November 1918.  Remembrance Day is the offical commemoration across the countries of the Commonwealth of the sacrifices of both members of the armed forces and civilians in times of war.  The extract from Binyon’s poem, which has become known as the Ode to Remembrance, evokes especially thoughts of those who died.
As one who was born long after the end of World War I and indeed after World War II it was Sebastian Faulk’s book Birdsong that first brought World War I vividly to life, some years ago.  Later, a visit to Ypres brought to mind the forgotten members of the Commonwealth who fought under the British flag.
Now, though, I wonder who we remember on this day, thinking of the many soldiers who give arms and legs but not their lives and those who give, simply, their mental health as a result of the horrors they witness on behalf of their country and in foreign lands across the world.
It seems to me that as we think of and honour the dead, we are at risk of overlooking the impact of war on those who are still alive. 

Choosing our forward path

All articles, ,

It is seventy years since the start of what has become known as the Blitz, a period beginning on 6th September 1940 and ending on 10 May 1941 during which the German Nazi Luftwaffe bombed towns and cities across the UK.  By the time the Blitz was over, more than  43,000 civilians, half of them in London, had been killed by bombing and more than a million houses were destroyed or damaged in London alone.

On Wednesday, home late after my rehearsal with the London Symphony Chorus, I watch ITV’s Words of the Blitz, in which footage of the Blitz is accompanied by readings from the diaries and letters of the men and women who experienced the attacks and their aftermath.  The people reading these letters include some who wrote them, and the descendants of some who wrote them.  Even knowing how unlikely it is that I will see what I seek, I find my eyes scanning the footage for a glimpse of my grandfather who, as a conscientious objector during World War II, chose to support the war effort by staying in London during the Blitz whilst his wife and children, including my mother, evacuated to Cornwall where they spent the war.  I wonder, too, about the full depth and breadth of experiences of my family during this time.

It is also nine years since the day that has become known as 9/11.  At home on the ninth anniversary I choose to watch Channel 4’s 9/11:  State of Emergency.  This minute-by-minute documentary combines both footage of the day and present-day testimonial to show how the day unfolded.  As it draws to a close, the narrator emphasises the thousands of decisions that were made that day and which, for many, meant the difference between life and death.

As I head towards bed, I ponder our present-day choices.  For it is one thing to look back on these events and reflect and another to make choices, based on our reflections, which shape our forward path.  I think of the men and women who have protested against plans to build an Islamic Centre and Mosque close to Ground Zero, the area that remains following the destruction of the Twin Towers on 9/11.  I think, too, of the US pastor who has made world news after saying he will burn a copy of the Koran in protest at the proposed Islamic Centre.  I know that each man and woman is making the best choices he or she knows how and I feel humble, knowing that I cannot know what choices I might make in their shoes.  And still, I yearn for choices that will move us towards – rather than away from – the outcomes I desire most.  Towards peace.  Towards understanding.  Towards compassion.  Towards harmony.

Seth Godin, formidable marketeer, puts it this way in his blog posting of Saturday, 11th September, 2010:

Lately, some marketers would like to push us to move from fear to hatred. It makes it easier for them. We honor and remember the heroes who gave everything, the innocent who were lost, the neighbors who narrowly escaped. A day to hate? I hope we can do better than that.

Autumn

All articles

By the time September starts autumn is already well on its way.  No matter how much the sun shines the mornings and evenings are fresh and the sky has a deep hue which signals a change of season.

There is a fullness as so much comes to fruition even whilst the signs of decay are already apparent.  The trees are laden with fruit.  The bushes, too.  I think of the daily crop of field mushrooms I loved to pick when I was growing up on my parents’ farm.  There is no doubt at this time of nature’s abundance.  So much is on offer that seems to have come by magic and without the efforts of human hands.  This is nature’s harvest.

 At the same time, the days are already shorter as they march slowly toward winter.  The trees are beginning to shed their leaves.  The temperature is dropping so that I am aware that soon I shall be closing doors and windows and turning on the heating.  Already I have raised the temperature of my morning shower.

 I find myself wondering what parallels there are in this change of seasons to our human experience.  How many of us harvest the fruits of our lives even as we are becoming aware of the passage of time towards our middle and even old age?  How many times, too, do we harvest the crop of one stage of our lives even as the signs are there that this stage is over.  How many of us miss this rich harvest of our Autumn as we connect with the fear evoked by our own slow march toward the winter of our lives.

 Each year I welcome the autumn with its fresh air, abundant fruits and deep vibrant colours.  May I also thrive in my own autumn seasons.

Work/life balance: what if time has nothing to do with it?

Emotional Intelligence,

As I write I am looking forward to the holiday I’ll be on when you read this posting.  I was curious today about the following question, posted on the Human Resources UK forum on LinkedIn:  Work/life balance – what is the right percentage?  This is what I wrote by way of response:

Percentage of what? Are you assuming that this is a matter of how much time an individual spends on work and on other-than-work? My experience suggests that this may be missing the point.

For example, the person who is in the wrong job – one that is not a good match for his skills and underlying sense of purpose – may lack work/life balance no matter what the hours he works. Or the person who has become wealthy and retired early and yet who lacks a sense of what to do with all that time may also struggle. At the same time, the person whose work is offering challenges which in turn provide deep learning and healing for the soul may be fulfilled in ways which spill over into every corner of his or her life even whilst the balance of time between work and home is totally precarious.

So here’s a question for you and others – what if time has nothing to do with work/life balance?