Our Disaster Addiction

Many of us are “crisis junkies.” That is to say that we have become addicted to crises.  Too often we find disasters around every corner.  When something turns out other than the way we expected, we think that it is awful and a disaster.

When we think something is awful, a crisis, and a disaster, we get very upset.  We may experience:

  • a panic attack
  • a psychophysiological disorder (our upset transforms us to experience pain and organ dysfunction)
  • psychosomatic illnesses
  • headache and/or stomach problems
  • sleep disorders
  • a need to overeat
  • addiction to the news (most of which is bad)
  • constant catastrophizing, awfulizing, and obsessing

We brood, ruminate, and continually worry. And, too often we keep watching the news so that we can catastrophize even more.  

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Improve Your Greetings!

Improve Your Greetings!

Make them special, memorable, and effective

Think about how often you participate in a routine, long, familiar, forgettable, and repetitive greeting when you meet someone and start a conversation. 

It generally goes something like this:

Them: “Hi, how are you?” 

You:   “Fine, thanks, and you?” 

Them: “I am doing fine as well.”   

And so on…Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah. 

This screenplay is so tired and dull.  Everyone seems to simply go on automatic pilot… reciting the same useless words.  

The entire exchange becomes an insincere and meaningless filler.

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Your Self-Respect Barometer

Making Wise Decisions

Consider the difference between being popular and being respected.  The following contrasts might get your attention.

The popular person:

  • Wants to be liked and avoids disapproval
  • Is largely dependent on the approval from others
  • Avoids conflict
  • Responds to peer pressure
  • Wants to fit in with everyone

The respected person:

  • Trusts their own judgment
  • Handles conflict well
  • Is okay with saying, “no”
  • Operates from strength
  • Displays strength of character
  • Often prefers to be eccentric

Which category appears to describe you?  In your network you may know people who prefer to be more in one category than the other.  It appears that more people want to be popular rather than be respected.  Perhaps they are operating more from weakness and are hostage to the approval of others.   Read more

Would You Rather Be Brilliant or Effective?

I have been honored to work with some really smart people on a global basis.  Many of them are those with whom I have had the pleasure of helping to be:

  • More persuasive
  • Better leaders
  • More influential
  • Higher performers
  • More skilled at relationships
  • Better communicators
  • More skilled in reaching agreements

Most of these people are well-educated and are highly skilled in their scope of practice.  They have a desire to be brilliant, smart, right, influential, respected, and admired.  They often want to make a difference in the world and in the lives of others.

I recall how frequently during my formal education I endured waiting for brilliant people to get my attention.  Many of my teachers and professors were routinely,   incomprehensively boring, disengaged, passionless, and apparently waiting for it to be over.

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IMPROVE THE GLUE

How do you strengthen the bond and the quality of your relationships?

As an expert in the field of psychology, equipping people in the areas of all things relationship and performance effectiveness, I routinely ask my patients what they want me to help them to improve.  The overwhelming majority of them respond that they want to be closer to the people in their personal and professional lives… they want more “glue” in their relationships.

It is remarkable that most everyone wants the same thing, yet rarely are they equipped or skilled in strengthening the bond and quality of their relationships.

These are my suggestions that I highly encourage you to put into practice: Read more

Ask For Help

As a species, we are a very curious bunch of characters. So often, rather than practice common sense we prefer to routinely practice insanity.  What is insanity?  Insanity is continuing the same counter-productive habit, getting the same bad outcome with the illusion that if we keep doing that habit we will receive a different outcome.

Among the 2 most insane habits most people practice in the United States are:

  1. We spend more than we have

And

  1. We eat more than we need (More than 2/3 of us are financially and physically obese.) Then we wonder why we are so broke and so unhealthy!

Here is another insane habit we so often practice around the world… failing to ASK FOR HELP. 

This is one of the most powerful and effective habits that humans generally avoid. Insanity!  

The paradox is that we often prevent the very thing that works – ASKING FOR HELP.   

To get started, here are some remarkably universal truths:

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Create Your Cheese List. Focus on the cheese and capitalize on your strengths.

If there is one thing that most everyone struggles with, it is their self-concept.  During my career as a psychotherapist, executive coach, and clinician, it is incontrovertible that most everyone spends his life suffering from any or all of the following:

  • Self-doubt
  • Insecurity
  • Poor self-image
  • Chronic anxiety
  • Self-loathing
  • Feeling inadequate and/or defective
  • Feeling unloved
  • Feeling like an imposter
  • Feeling weak and afraid

It is remarkable that so many people spend their lives perpetually taking inventory of what is wrong and defective about them rather than focusing on their good qualities, value, skills, and special contributions.

When you think about it, there was a period in our lives between pre-school and elementary school when we largely felt happy, excited, pleased, courageous, and generally pretty good about ourselves.  We were happy, our family was largely reinforcing, loving, and excited about our growth.  We liked to show-off, sing, play, and dance in public.  We said things like: Read more

THE AXIOMS OF LIFE

After several decades of practicing in the human relationship and performance effectiveness business I have come to realize that there are some incontrovertible truths about the business of living. They became evident to me over the years as I began to assemble them from the lessons I learned.

Understanding these truths and then guiding your life trajectory by living by them can make your life much more fulfilling, especially if you want to be happy, successful, highly functional, and well adjusted — as most of us do.

I call these truths the AXIOMS OF LIFE©.  There are 8 AXIOMS and I will be presenting them one at a time on YouTube this summer for your viewing and for your consideration.

#1 AXIOM OF LIFE

LIFE IS AS IT IS INSTEAD OF HOW IT SHOULD BE.

You may often find yourself believing that life is supposed to be different than the way it is. You are supposed to be good looking, healthy, fortunate, born into a good family, educated, safe, privileged, smart, lucky, impressive, respected, and popular. You are supposed to be happy, brilliant, successful, and perpetually young.

While all the above is the way life is supposed to be, you will likely notice that real life is often quite different. Life turns left when it is supposed to turn right.  Sometimes you lose your job, waste your time, make bad decisions, manage money poorly, or perpetuate bad habits.  Sometimes you get sick, let down, betrayed, divorced, and get old.

Moreover, you may complain and describe the problem more than doing anything to solve it.

SO, WHAT DO YOU DO ABOUT THIS?

I recently presented a recording of this Axiom #1 on YouTube. I included some ideas and suggestions on how you can much more effectively reconcile the gap between how life is supposed to be and how it is.

If you would like to see this recording, click here:

   

AXIOM #2 is entitled LIFE IS UNFAIR, LIFE IS FAIR, AND IT’S BOTH.  I encourage you to take a look at that one as well. 

Be sure to send me your comments and reflections on the videos.

Many thanks for your time and support!

If you like the material, click to subscribe to my YouTube channel here!   https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-7x3R1mJJg5AyatzINR5iw?view_as=subscriber

And let me know how you are doing!

The Most Powerful Key to Resolve Conflict, Reach Agreements, Persuade Others, and Engage Recovery… CREATE MULTIPLE OPTIONS

Do you notice how often it appears difficult to DECIDE WITH SOMEONE WHERE YOU WILL GO TO DINNER?  With your spouse, it may sound something like this:

You: “Where do you want to go to dinner?”

Spouse: “I don’t care.”

You: “Ok, why don’t we go to Alfredo’s?”

Spouse: “Hmmmmm. NO!”

You: “Ok then, so where do you want to go?”

Spouse: “I told you, I DON’T CARE!”  (Of course, you are now both infected with that chronic and familiar state of mind where nothing sounds good!)

You: (As you are becoming increasingly crabby and impatient and you start imagining what you now might want to say.)  Ok, so why don’t I go to Alfredo’s and you stay home!!!”         

Now both of you are cranky, defensive, and whatever appetite you may have had has evaporated!  

Does this sound familiar? 

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Taking Things Too Personally

“I take things too personally” is a remark I hear frequently from my patients, associates, colleagues, and friends. Many people become hypersensitive, defensive, and full of self-doubt because of this problem.   

  • If you fail to get an invitation to lunch, a party, or a wedding, do you take it personally and then doubt yourself and your popularity?
  • If someone else gets the contract, do you believe you have failed to deliver?
  • If your boss forgets to say good morning, do you automatically think that he/she is angry with you?
  • If your spouse comes home crabby, do you feel responsible, guilty, irritated, defensive, or crabby yourself?
  • If your guests want to go home early, does that immediately suggest they dislike your company?
  • If your daughter is unhappy, do you start concluding that you have to be unhappy in order to show her how much you care?
  • If several of your colleagues are going to lunch together and you are not invited, do you worry they will talk about you at lunch?

We can have our whole day ruined because someone else’s behavior rubs off on us and we feel responsible. We find that whenever someone else is upset, we feel great pressure that somehow we are to blame. As a result, we take their behavior personally, which makes us defensive, anxious, miserable, and insecure.

It is important to gain some understanding as to the root of this problem and look at some possible reasons why we become hypersensitive and take things too personally. With this understanding, you will gain some valuable perspective on how to handle the problem more effectively. 

Consider these roots of taking things too personally:   Read more