The Power of Curiosity

Tom Peters’ book In Search of Excellence is regarded as one of the most influential business books of all time. In an article about the book, Peters says, “There was no carefully designed work plan. There was no theory that I was out to prove. I went out and talked to genuinely smart, remarkably interesting, […]

Why Reinvention is Hard

Reinventing yourself means the people in your life will have to think about and deal with you differently.  Their Jedi Mind Tricks will no longer work on you.  Their expectations will no longer be met in the same way.  They won’t know what box to put you in, and that rocks their world. In the […]

Five Reminders

We live in a chaotic, random, dynamic system. Order and control are illusions. We are biological. The condition and health of our bodies dictate how we experience every aspect of our lives. We are driven by deeply embedded programming. We are far more sensitive, intuitive, and easily influenced than we think. We are model makers […]

Are You In, or Into Something Else?

I’m In Saying “I’m in” means you are committing your resources—your time, energy, attention, and intentions—to something. “I’m in” energy propels us forward, creates self-confidence, and inspires confidence in others.  “I’m in” to this means “I’m not in” to something else.  It’s a true decision. I’m Not In Really?  It’s never that you’re not in; […]

We Suffer from Lack of Curation and Signposts

The Pali Canon is the collected wisdom of Theravada Buddhism. It contains about 1.5 million words. All Buddhists know the Four Noble Truths. That’s fewer than 100 words and gives you a lifetime of things to work on. The King James Bible is about 780,000 words. If all you did every day was live the […]

Four Encouragements

Sometimes it helps to remind ourselves to . . . Show Up You can’t win if you’re not on the field.  You can’t play if you’re in the wrong place at the wrong time.  There’s no point in being there if you’re not really going to be there. Simply showing up consistently in a high-quality […]

The Three Phases of Work

Anything worth doing is worth doing well. If you believe that, then you know you need to put in the work. This is true of any category of human activity. Mastery comes through repetition and stacking one focused moment on another, one skill on another. When you start, progress seems to come quickly. The effort […]

Sometimes, What You Stop Doing is More Important

Innovation and reinvention are the lifeblood of healthy firms and happy professionals. Starting is the easy part. We struggle to innovate because we don’t know what to stop doing. If we don’t stop doing things, we can’t start doing other things. If you want to become more innovative, figure out what you need to keep (stay) doing and […]