It’s Saturday morning in Moorestown, NJ and everyone is out – families, children.  Main Street in this old town is packed.  The Pie Lady (a yummy meeting place) is sold out of home baked goodies even before the end of the work day.

Don’t these people know there is a coronavirus warning?

Yes, they do.  They are just rediscovering close family ties in the era of mobile devices and social distancing.

These are challenging times.  There is no doubt limiting mass public gatherings helps reduce the effect of this pandemic.

But there are some benefits if you look for them.

Pay attention to the things that you may not have had time for.  Accept the new challenges (many college professors are sure learning how to use mobile teaching in record time).

This will end but while we are sequestered, there are things to be accomplished.

This virus is scary.

Coronavirus is serious but as with other diseases and even pandemics, the chance of contracting them are still very small.

When an airplane crashes, it is so dramatic, ugly that many fear air travel for a while after a big accident yet flying is statistically the safest form of travel.

The Spanish flu pandemic in 1918, the deadliest in history, infected a third of the world’s population, killing as many as 50 million people and 675,000 Americans.

That’s 3% of the world’s population or another way to look at it is 97% survived.

Serious world health issues should be taken seriously.

The facts provide some reassurance in the Twitter world.

Everyone has a resume and most of them are the same.

Thought you might be interested in what I advise college seniors looking for their first job or undergrads looking for a special internship.

Make a list of 7 specific reasons you should be hired on one page.

Bold each number and reason.

Add one (and only one) additional line for each of the 7 reasons that gives concrete evidence to back your claim.

Examples:

1. Work well with people – I use principles I learned in a human relations course I took.
2. Generate new income quickly – Increased revenue 54% in the first six months.
3. Can help Ajax Industries with the turnover problem – Reversed turnover by 30% in the first year. 

Be specific, provide evidence and make those 7 items so compelling your resume will rise to the top.

In my NYU classes, I don’t dictate “turn your phones off”.

What seems to work better for the students and the professor is to ask “how do we want to deal with our phones”.

I explain what I need – their attention.

They usually say they would like to be able to use their phones (to text not call) if something is important to which I say “I’ll respect your right to walk out in the hall if you need to”.

By setting ground rules that are specific to everyone involved (they differ with each group), all of us have a stake in what we’ve decided.

Sound like a plan for home, work or elsewhere where the phone has become life not a lifeline?

99% of what you fear will never happen, it’s true.

The 1% of the time when it does, your fear rarely if ever is the way you obsessed about it making even 1% too much to devote to worry. 

Staying busy reduces fear. 

Focusing on others helps us forget at least for a time that which is bothering us.

Worry is like an onion — it comes in layers and often brings tears to your eyes. 

And if all that fails, remember that it is a scientific fact that the brain can be trained to reduce anxiety but to do that you will have to begin creating new anti-worry habits.

How are we expected to reduce stress and fear and worry when even trying to rein them in is fraught with even more anxiety?

You just can’t deal with anxiety by becoming more anxious.

Ironically, slowing down is more of a positive force.

Sometimes it is not necessarily what we are doing to make ourselves so stressed as much as it is the number of things we take on.

Slowing the pace directly answers that problem.

I’m reading Tiny Habits:  The Small Changes That Change Everything by BJ Fogg.

For example, the more motivated you are to do a behavior, the more likely you are to do the behavior.

The harder a behavior is to do, the less likely you are to do it.

The easier a behavior is to do, the more likely the behavior will become habit.

Motivation and ability work together like teammates.

This is the reason we pick easier things to do even when they are less important.

Change takes place in small, incremental steps and being aware of it gives you the advantage.

Why does happiness seem so elusive?

Sometimes looking at the big picture distracts from observing the things you already have.

Health, family, friends, a job – all of which we seem to appreciate more when we lose them.

So the drill is – look for the good in what you have and you’ll have more good days and the challenging ones will be more bearable.

This is the mindset of a person not looking for paybacks and not expecting them.

Doing good is enough.

Good karma comes back as good and bad as bad.

While you’re not always rewarded immediately after doing good things for others, the payoff always arrives.

Total happiness can be a long wait.

If you’ve ever known anyone driven to achieve their biggest dream, you have witnessed the painful life of a person who puts everything else on hold while they plow forward.

Big dreams are fine.

It’s the little things that also inspire happiness along the way – things that may be ignored in your quest for the dream and may happen when you’re busy doing something else.

As the author Harold Kushner says, “Happiness is a butterfly – the more you chase it, the more it flies away from you and hides.  But, stop chasing it, put away your net and busy yourself with other, more productive things than the pursuit of personal happiness, and it will sneak up on you from behind and perch on your shoulder”.

Do you know what I mean?

Does that make sense? 

We need to have a conversation.

When people don’t listen, they make it impossible to communicate.

Asking if the message got through is no guarantee.

Inviting two-way talk when both are not paying attention is the opposite of communication.

Until you can hear it and say back to the other person accurately there has been no communication.

Ironically, working on listening skills is the secret to effective communication and it has little to do with talking.

Hard driving people are not assured of success and happiness.

Ever work for someone like that (or maybe you are the hard driving kind)?

It’s easy to confuse go-getter with “go, get her”.

Confidence over pep talks. 

Reliability over risk taking.

Consensus over dissention.

Look at it like this:  what kind of person would you like to work for (live with, be friends with).

A hyperactive dynamo might not be your choice.

Once you’ve described that person, be that person.

Change is a funny thing.

Most of us say we want it, maybe even expect it but change is upsetting and we often wind up fearing it.

But “better” is more compelling than “change”.  Who doesn’t want better?

If we see our daily lives as evolving instead of changing, we will become more open to the disruptions that even positive change can bring.

Change is scary.

Remaining the same is dangerous.

Striving for better is how we evolve into the fascinating people we really are.

One of my NYU students who is also seeking to master skills of human relations borrowed one from Dale Carnegie the other day – “Begin with praise and honest appreciation” of others.

That’s a good one for ourselves as well.

We are exposed to criticism all day long – some blatant, some subtle.

It’s also not a bad thing to be able to praise and appreciate yourself as an instant confidence boost.

It’s nice to have someone else point out your good points, but sometimes that can be a long wait.

Be proud to recognize the good in you when you see it.

The one thing about anxiety is that it creates more anxiety.

It’s almost as if what you’re worried about is not as important as how it speeds up the worry process.

Anxious people are obsessed with their worries.  Any worries.  All worries.

Slow is the friend of stressed out people.  They just don’t realize it.

Become aware of what happens when you change the pace of how you look at things.

Even little irritations can’t drive us crazy.

The secret is you can’t hurry up and calm down.

Slow down and get immediate relief.

Parents now spend only 5 hours communicating face-to-face with their children per week.

TV, too much time in their rooms and their phones are among the reasons for the worsening disconnect.

This is forcing concerned parents to change.

Learning to play the popular video game Fortnite (yes, 20% in the Cadbury Hereos survey admitted to it).

39% are becoming more involved in their children’s hobbies.

33% have taken an interest in their child’s music – listening to their favorite bands and artists.

But mobile devices are a bad excuse for absentee parenting because many of these parents are setting a bad example by outsourcing their relationships to digital devices.

To reconnect, it’s not necessary to disconnect.

Simply connect with lots of face time and person-centered interest.

The phone is a tool, making it your life is for fools.

When something goes wrong, most of us have no problem quickly assigning the blame to who (other than us) is responsible.

When something goes right, it is often welcomed with surprise.

You don’t play sports by being surprised if you win because you won’t win unless you believe it first.

If you can quickly name who ruined your dream then you likely gave that person too much control over your life.

Why is it that blame comes easily and success comes surprisingly?

To be happy, expect to win and when you lose, expect to win the next time.

B.J. Fogg has a bestselling book titled Tiny Habits in which motivation, ability and prompt (the opportunity) are described as the best ways to make changes.

We’ve been warned with the age-old Chinese saying “The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step” but we rarely use that wisdom as the basis for getting things done.

In short, if you have the ability, motivation and opportunity, take one small step toward that which you want to accomplish.

Change your mindset.

Stop trying to conquer the world.

Start taking small steps in the right direction.

The idea that little things can be easily accomplished is a big thing.

I was sharing with my students last week the benefits of failing.

1. You find out how badly you really want something if your response is to not give up.
2. You almost always guarantee that you will eventually succeed if you keep getting up and trying again (remember Thomas Edison tried 10,000 times to make the lightbulb work – it was just when, not if).
3. You overcome the fear of failure in the future when you train yourself to look at failure as a rehearsal for your eventual success.

No matter how you cherish the friendship of others, the best friendship is the one you develop with yourself.

Can you count on you?

Do you know what values you stand for?

Do you outsource your enthusiasm for success to others or generate your own?

Do you love yourself for all the good things you are (can you rattle off a list of ten of them right now)?

Are you always there for you even when you’re hurting or when you’re confused?

The very traits we value so much in a special friend should be readily available in ourselves.

If we can’t be our own best friend, why would someone else want to be?