Just saying the words dignity and respect makes you straighten up and feel proud.

It gives us positive reaction just hearing the sounds of words that are power packed.

U.S. Air Force General Jay Silveria, the superintendent of The Air Force Academy told his young cadets:

“If you can’t treat someone with dignity and respect – then you need to get out”. 

It’s arguable as to whether the person being treated with dignity and respect or the one doing it benefits most.

Aim high.

Think big.

Be proud.

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Everyone wants to change – get better, be happier, make more money – but it’s just talk.

Change grows out of gratitude for what we already have.

To turn words into action, try this.

When you awake in the morning, spend five minutes before you get out of bed or as you are showering to name 5 people you are grateful for and 5 things you are grateful for.

You may repeat the same people and things often or daily, but you must say why.

Your spouse because they are supportive of you.

Your parent(s) for instilling special qualities in you.

The person who gave you your first break because without them … 

The doctor that saved your life or made it better.

Your children for keeping you young and exuberant.

After you’ve recalled 5 of each, return to the real world.

But wait!

Don’t be surprised if you can’t stop at 5 – and if you add more later in the day.

I start my days like this and I find it almost impossible to do only 5.

Impossible to do only 5 minutes.

And impossible to stop.

Gratitude is the change agent that eludes everyone that is right in front of our eyes.

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Already – just a few weeks into the 2017-18 NHL hockey season, one of the league’s top stars found himself in a slump.

Toronto Maple Leafs Auston Matthews had a great rookie year last year but as with all athletes (and the rest of us) slumps happen.

In hockey, the players grab the stick harder and bear too much thus continuing the sub-par performance.

In baseball, players pick up bad habits trying to get rid of bad habits that came out of nowhere. 

• Repeat this positive phrase – This slump will not last forever.  I will beat it.  Outlast it.  Won’t let it wear down my confidence.  I will look at a slump as a test of my will.
• A winning streak usually follows a slump – True of athletes who once they break through make up for the lost time.  Also, true of the rest of us who may feel we’re frustrated to perform at our best level when we are feeling pressure.
• Learn from a slump – When what we want or are accustomed to producing evades us, a slump can be a benefit if it tests our will to succeed.  Nothing is more valuable than to deeply believe that we have the will to succeed.  A slump lets us show it.

No one says you have to like a slump in your work or personal life, but it is not the end of the world.

In fact, it’s the beginning of a new winning streak once you test your will to persevere.

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43% of U.S. employees work remotely all or part of the time according to a new Gallup Poll.

IBM pioneered telecommuting but now has had a change of heart citing new research.

So IBM is calling their workforce back to the office to collaborate face to face on problem solving.  40% of IBM’s workforce was working remotely in 2009.  Whether reverting back is a more productive solution, time will tell.

But for employees who resist (including me as I work 80% remotely), there are hidden benefits.

Telecommuting often runs into personal hours and has been accepted routinely as part of the territory.  But in France there are laws that forbid employers from requiring their employees to answer work emails after hours.

Personal and work get mixed together.  Just check Instagram for any person you know who is working remotely and don’t be surprised to find that they have commented or posted content (same with Facebook, Twitter and other social networks).  You can see their “likes” even if they don’t publicly post.

Family and inter-personal time gets compromised.  How many dinners or night time hours are interrupted by someone on your team working virtually?

The answer may not be in banning virtual work platforms although the research clearly favors the results when people work together face to face.

More importantly, be cognizant of how working remotely leaves your life more remote from the people you care about.

Then fix it.

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I’m looking out the window at the tee box for the eighth hole.

Golf is no longer a game of 100% concentration.

While a man’s wife was teeing off, he was scrolling through his phone messages in his cart.

When a group of teenage boys passed through, they checked their phones before hitting the ball and then again, every time they walked to their ball to hit.

Really?

Is that the way we want to live addicted to our phones so much so that we can’t put them away for fear of missing something while we are golfing.

I suspect you can plug in any sport or for that matter any other activity and find a prominent role for a smartphone.

The phones are smart but using them like this, the owners are not so smart.

The phone is a tool not a substitute for living in the present.

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The brain works in two ways.

The default setting is one in which our minds wander.

The second is focused in an undistracted way.

Why is it increasingly hard to focus?

Too much self-absorption – the inability to be in the now 100% laser focused on something other than ourselves. 

A lack of sincere gratitude even for bad things that happen to us that will eventually become transformative.

And the absence of kindness to other people even those who may not appreciate you.

The brain can be trained.

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Anxiety is a very tough condition to conquer.

Pills, therapy, meditation and many other solutions have been tried.

One additional tool is to push off anxious feelings to only certain times in the day.

Anxiety hour may be from 8 to 9 pm if you choose so when the feeling of anxiety comes over you, time shift it until the time you have reserved to deal with it.

Then for that hour and only that hour, feel free to ruminate about what is eating you but only for that hour.

Most people are surprised to find that when they time shift their worries and anxieties, they dispense with them sooner than they thought.

And free themselves up to live a fuller, less anxious life for the other 23 hours.

Anxieties don’t always go away even when problems are solved but time shifting trains us to be less obsessed and therefore happier and more productive.

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If you make your focus talking about the other person and their interests, they will become more interested in you.

Even in the digital age of self-absorption, selfies and competing for likes and follows, no one can resist a person-centered conversation.

Conversation starters …

How are you? (being careful not to also chime in with how you are unless asked)

What do you think?

Why?

A person-centered conversation with the focus on the other person should sound like you’re doing an interview.

It is amazing how responsive people will be to anyone who masters the art of being person-centered.

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Nike said “Just Do It” as a means of encouraging people to participate.

“Get It Done” means for all the team planning, study and collaboration, the most successful individual will be the one who actually makes the plans happen.

That’s who you want to be.

The one who follows through.

Who doesn’t lose site of the goal.

Who seeks solutions to problems that crop up along the way.

Here are the qualities of successful people that are often underestimated:

1. The ability to win the cooperation of others
2. Being the one who gets the project done

As the world becomes more consolidated and even robotic, these two skills will always assure that you are in demand.

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No words spoken by another can be as damaging as the words we repeat over and over in our head that are critical.

Success is passed over and often forgotten – even major accomplishments.

Somehow it is easier for most people to be critical of themselves than it is to be appreciative.

There is no need for an inner critic.

No way we should be our own worst enemy.

Those little voices of self-doubt that affect confidence.

Have you ever heard someone say to you, “Give me constructive criticism.”?  I want it.

A better response is: ”What do you think you’ve done well and what can you do better”.

Balance the quest for perfection with an appreciation of accomplishment.

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