The Fire Within

Does anyone else find it ironic we are dealing with a pandemic when our social medial culture talks so much about going viral? The number of people who have a hobby or even make a living trying to get TikTok famous is ridiculous. Frantically checking back on their posts to see how many likes they got. Seth Godin has talked for years about how ideas spread much like a virus. It doesn't matter if the ideas are good or bad, it is a matter of if you can get people to talk and share it. There are people that will try to share anything, just to get the likes and clicks. We all have a voice. We all have a choice on what words we share. If you went viral what would people catch from you?

Being able to go with the flow is generally a pretty good quality to have. Circumstances change, information changes, people leave companies or move away. As things change having the resiliency to adapt to the new circumstances is an important quality. Now more than ever we need to be flexible. We are having to live in new and different ways. People learning to work from home, do online school, figure out ways to stay in shape and able to perform in their activity of choice. Challenges are nothing more than learning opportunities. The key is to accept things aren't like they used to be. Complaining about it doesn't change any of your current circumstances. So often in life the only thing we can control is how we respond in various situations. The situations we can rarely control, but we can always own our response. We must also remember that not everyone faces the same challenges. While some of us are complaining of having to work in the same room as our spouse every day,...

Going fast or going slow - is one more important than the other? We are told to take the time to think through things. Don't over analyze. Jump on an opportunity. Don't rush into a big decision. Which one is it? I was recently watching a basketball game and the commentary was around the skill of the point guard. He is amazingly quick, with or without a basketball. But what they really took note of is how he could slow things down when needed. It was his ability to go fast or go slow that kept the defense on their toes. Baseball is the same thing when it comes to pitching. The most successful pitchers are those who can change the speed of their pitches but make their arm motion look the same. The hitters then don't know how to time their swing. You know the lesson coming. There isn't a rule on when to go fast or slow, it is about knowing when to use both effectively that will make you more successful. I see it in my work where there are times that it is important t...

Who you are as a person is primarily a product of the people you choose to associate with. If you spend most of your time with high character people, they are going to have a positive affect on you. Just like in the reverse when you choose people of questionable character it can lead you down the wrong path. We've all known people who have made bad choices and we say, "They just fell in with the wrong crowd." I'm sure there is some parenting guide somewhere that says we are supposed to let our kids make their own mistakes, and we can't tell them who they should be friends with. I obviously have never read it because I have no problem sharing my opinion with them. I've never had to tell them they have to stop being friends with someone, but we talk and I openly share with them who I think are good friends and who I'm okay with them not spending time with because I don't think they are a very nice person. Can we do that with ourselves or with our fri...

Where is the shortcut? What is the path of least resistance? Can you show me the steps you did so I can copy them and not figure them out on my own? Can you just give me the answer? Life at times gives us hard problems. Be it work, school, relationships, or teams - each at times throws us something that can be frustrating. The answers aren't right in front of us. Google doesn't lead you to the page with the step-by-step instructions on how to solve it. What do you do now? Those hard problems are exactly what they need you to figure out. We need more people capable of taking a hard problem and finding a solution. It may mean banging your head against the wall until you find a break through, but it is a hard problem, it is okay that your head hurts a little coming out of it. If you want an easy answer that is easy to look up and repeat the same steps you are in for a world of hurt because the world is changing. Robotics and artificial intelligence is changing jobs rapidly....

I have to admit, this whole world of Social Media Influencers baffles me. Did we seriously let this become a thing? There are people out there whose job it is to create a large enough audience so people pay them to advertise their goods and services to their tribe. What's worse is we have parents that are working hard to exploit their children to turn them into the next great influencer on YouTube or Instagram. There are kids that are millionaires before they turn 10. The easy argument is that if someone is willing to pay a kid the money, the child and parents have the right to accept that payment. I am actually completely okay with that. What I am more concerned with is the fact that we the audience become so enamored with these influencers that we start blindly following them, liking what they want us to like and buying what they tell us to buy. As a society we continue to be hounded by people and companies vying for our limited attention. It is a slippery slope between looking...