Reluctant gratitude unexpectedly breaths new life.
Karl Edwards
Category: Working Matters
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Karl Shares Six Words… #51
Pretending he didn’t see the misstep.
Karl Edwards
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Loving Learning. Or… Learning, Like It or Not
The new school year is well underway. Midterms to take, papers to write, projects to complete.School is the realm of learning, standards, and grades. The place where improving is the name of the game.
For those of us not in a structured learning environment like a school, we need a way to keep learning: improve, deepen, and broaden ourselves, our capabilities, and our relationships.
There’s a myth out there in our culture of the strong competent leader. This myth would have us believe that to be effective and/or in charge we need to be (or pretend to be) beyond learning and training.
We know everything we need to know already. We can do everything we need to do already. We teach, evaluate and correct others. We don’t have anything else (more…)
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Loving Monday: Go For It!
Go for it!My, that was easy to say.
Some words are easier to say than to do.
Go for it! is an enthusiastic, high confidence encouragement to dive in without hesitation or reservation.
Commit. Invest. Push. Give it everything you’ve got. Operate with abandon, joy, zeal.As I said, easy to say. Not always easy to do.
There are times when we’re weary. There are obstacles we encounter along the way. Not everyone is encouraging in either their words or deeds.
As much as we may desire to “Go for it!” our reality is sometimes dimmer, slimmer or grimmer. (No corny rhyming intended, though I must admit I’m smiling.)
Sometimes we need someone to shout “Go for it!” as a reminder, as an exhortation to action, or as a walk-up call.
Sometimes we need to tell ourselves to “Go for it!” so that we don’t miss out, settle for less, or get into a rut.
Sometimes the easy words are needed as a catalyst to the more difficult action.
So to you I say, “Go for it!”
You are a gift… even if you are currently weary.
You have a contribution to make… even if you’re having trouble seeing your way forward.
The complexities of today are a part of your life as much as any of the idealized futures you are building for yourself.
So, “Go for it!”
On your side,
– Karl Edwards
Loving Monday is a weekly column designed to encourage us to step into our weeks with an intention to show up authentically, engage fully, and choose to make it a good week for ourselves. Explore past columns here.
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Quote to Consider: Happiness Unconditionally
“I accept life unconditionally. … Most people ask for happiness on condition. Happiness can only be felt if you don’t set any condition.”Arthur Rubinstein
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Make Your Weekend a Weekend!
The weekend is upon us. Or is it?
You may have already left the office. Or have you?
Just a friendly reminder to make your weekend a weekend.
I like playing cards with friends and will be doing so later this evening. I let down, relax, and thoroughly enjoy the company and competition.
What activity or lack of activity helps you relax and let down after a busy week?
We all need our weekend.
The mind needs a break. The body needs a break. Our souls need a break.
When we keep pushing all of the time, our capacity to continue at the same levels of effectiveness diminishes and diminishes.
Not only do we become less effective in the short term, we deplete and exhaust ourselves in the long term.
So do yourself a favor this weekend and give yourself a weekend.
Gather the friends for cards or games. Get out on the golf course or the frisbee golf course. Spend a day at the beach, in the mountains, or at the lake. Curl up with a good book. Try cooking something new. Build something with your hands.
Whatever you end up doing, please, on behalf of all of us who have to face you on Monday, make your weekend a weekend!
On your side,
– Karl Edwards
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Karl Shares Six Words… #50
Stupid: Consulting everyone except your assistant.
Karl Edwards
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Beware, Verizon Just Doesn’t Get It
Verizon had the opportunity today to invest in a happy and contented long-term customer for $40.I asked that they credit back $40 worth of disputed fees that arose from me mis-navigating a poorly designed web site.
But no. They’d rather take the chance on me taking my business elsewhere.
But no. They’d rather I telephone their call center and take the salaried and benefit-laden time of one of their customer representatives for any need I have in the future instead of using their web site ever again.
For $40 worth of incorrectly incurred fees, they could have secured a happy long-term customer.
Instead they would rather risk losing $65/month for the next however many years. Instead they would rather discourage usage of their web site and encourage the use of their live call centers, whatever their recorded on-hold messages say to the contrary.
So beware. Any mistake you make on their intentionally misleading web site will be your fault.
So beware. Any fees you inadvertently incur by trusting the misleading online instructions are your responsibility to notice and notify them about before a billing cycle passes its arbitrary mid-month date.
No one at Verizon can help you. No one at Verizon has the authority to do anything after a billing cycle has passed.
No one at Verizon has it in their job description to improve the system, or to receive a suggestion, or to care about the systemic craziness of spending thousands of dollars on salaries to do what a well-designed web site could accomplish, or to spend $40 once in order to continue receiving $65/month indefinitely.
I have some thinking to do about what I am going to do now that I know that Verizon has a sub-line of services making money on the errors of their customers.
Last I heard, your customers were your clients, not your victims.
Verizon seems to be making money, though. Maybe we should all try to cheat our customers at every turn and blame them for the privilege.
I think I’m done with my venting.
As for you, though. Beware.
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Loving Monday: Raising the White Flag… In Victory
It’s okay to surrender. Really.Not all battles are adversarial conflicts in which there is a winner and a loser.
Could it be possible that on some occasions the smartest course of action might be to surrender?
That to win in in the big picture would mean to admit that you’ve lost in the current scene?How on earth can admitting defeat be a victory?
When you need help.
When you’ve got too much to do or need skill sets that you yourself don’t have, it’s smarter to surrender.
It’s a victory to recognize your limits. The sooner you get a handle on what you can and cannot contribute, the sooner you can surround yourself with the people, skills and resources necessary to get the job done and done well.
The defeat comes in pushing yourself until you burn out, make a costly mistake, (more…)
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Quote to Consider: Creating Your Own Alternatives
“It is the characteristic excellence of the strong man that he can bring momentous issues to the fore and make a decision about them. The weak are always forced to decide between alternatives they have not chosen themselves.”Dietrich Bonhoeffer