One of my favorite gems is: “there’s nothing worse than doing something well that doesn’t need to be done at all”.

Just one critical step before we pour our time and effort into that which we want to accomplish could make all the difference in the world.

What’s the goal?

What do we specifically want to accomplish?

It’s amazing how many people set off to change the world and fix what’s broken without spending enough time figuring out what would make a positive difference.

Meetings are the biggest time wasters but no one seems to get the message. They wind up being rambling and sometimes dangerous interludes that do nothing toward accomplishing goals. Never have a meeting without first identifying the goal.

Improving your health is laudable but it is such a general wish. What specifically do you want to accomplish? Run longer and faster to build more stamina – there, it’s identified.

Being a better parent? Again, who doesn’t want that goal? Identify a meaningful way to be a better parent. For example: discover new things together with your children without cellphones interfering.

Changing careers? Why? What is your dream? If you know that, you can work on acquiring the skills that will bring you success.

You can’t hit a target you cannot see.

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In years gone by that I would like to forget, I can remember sitting in a lawyer’s office in America’s playground, Camden, NJ, getting madder by the minute.

He was not too proud to throw red meat at me — to keep reminding me of everything the ex was trying to do in his opinion and by the time I left the office I was so worked up I forget that I should have been hoping my car wasn’t stolen in the crack capital of the state.

It was like Saul Goodman of Better Call Saul TV fame.

Animosity comes with the breakdown of relationships – and it doesn’t just take lawyers to feed the monster, often relatives and close friends do it in their attempt to be supportive.

Divorce or breaking up with a former loved one is not a game with winners and losers even if the courts and the laws lose sight of the children who are often the victims.

There is a lot on the line – money, houses, children, hurt feelings, rejection, unresolved anger.

Fast forward years down the road and it’s interesting that both sides of a breakup usually move on – some even happily – and life goes on for all.

Neither partner is the villain.

My daughter’s favorite chapter in my book Out of Bad Comes Good, The Advantages of Disadvantages is the one on divorce in which I conclude that out of bad marriages come good people.

Sometimes we’re not the right partners, sometimes it’s not the right time and sometimes we can do great things like bring beautiful children into the world.

Even if the system makes it difficult, divorce is about healing and future chances to make life right for the parties involved.

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Politicians experience tremendous highs from the adulation of winning an election, to the agony of defeat that often follows later in their careers.

A successful executive can be riding high until they hit a bump in the road and then they fall off their pedestal.

Beloved people can be hated.

Hated people can be given a second chance.

What is more important than being successful?

Success is fleeting – it is a product of learning from failure.

More important than being rich – after all, a Pew study tells us that it only takes the average couple $75,000 a year for them to be happy.  Anything over that, according to what they told Pew, didn’t make them happier.

What one quality can make a person loved in good times and bad?

Humility.

Humility is the other “h” word – other than hubris, which is excessive pride or self-confidence.

The Dali Lama comes to mind.

Amit Sood, MD, the author of Stress Free Living is nothing if not humble.

Mariano Rivera, the great Yankees relief pitcher was beloved by fans as much as their opponent hated the Yankees.

Humility is the fine art of giving credit to everyone else when it is being heaped on you.

No one doesn’t like a person who gives credit to others – maybe even them.

I could stand to be better at this, how about you?

I have had a few moments.  For example, I do not have any awards that have been given to me in my possession.  I have given them all away publicly to the people who helped me earn them.   I handed my mentor at Dale Carnegie, Jim Weinraub, the award I received for giving the best speech to instructors and I did it in front of our peers.

Now that I think of it, I need to do more of this kind of stuff.

Humility is the quality that not only makes a person beloved, it makes us feel better about ourselves.

And the glue to make it all authentic is to be sincere.

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When the Seahawks and Patriots play their Super Bowl game for arguably the greatest championship in sports, both teams will have a 50% chance of winning the game before it begins.

Yes, that Arizona Sun could blind New England or the lack of rain could stifle the Seattle game plan but in theory both teams are showing up thinking that they can win it all that day.

Maybe not by halftime if one team is hopelessly behind, or maybe yes if they believe in miracles to borrow a phrase from Al Michaels.

When two teams play, one doesn’t show up and say I am afraid to lose.  They think, I am willing to lose if I expect to win.

But we humans are not always that pumped up.

In fact, 99% of the time if we show up afraid to lose, we are not going to win.

What baseball player thinks, “Don’t hit the ball to me, I might drop it”.

It’s the opposite, they think “Hit the ball to me, I want it”.  They don’t worry about making mistakes.

If you study successful people, they are less afraid to lose which gives them a better chance to win.

How does this apply to us – actually, it hits close to home.

For example when we say, “I really don’t want to blow this” we are focusing on the negative, becoming too cautious, too concerned about doing what we do best.

Or when we say, “I’ve waited a long time for this chance” we are subconsciously saying “and I better not blow it”.

You know the fabled tale of the modern parent who tells her kids that they won the soccer match even when they lost it.  You know, they’re trying to keep their spirits up but they are robbing them of a life-changing lesson.

There is much value to losing – what doesn’t kill me makes me stronger as Kelly Clarkson sang to us.  And it is true.

If Serena Williams secretly thought, “I’m afraid to lose” she’d be doing all the work for her opponent.

You have to be willing to lose to win.

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February shows the biggest decline for attendance at health clubs of any month in the year.

Ironically, January is the biggest growth time because people generally want to resolve to get in better shape for the New Year.

So much for that.

What it says to me is that we humans often want that which we are not committed to achieving.

A 2006 study by researchers at London’s University College indicates that it takes 66 days to form a habit – or about two months.

A lot of research turns out to be just curiosity but this little stat is packed with power.

In others words, instead of saying, “I want to be healthier next year” what if we said, “I will devote two months to doing what it takes to be healthier next year”.

I’ve always believed when we fail at something we are not necessarily saying we cannot attain it, we are saying we don’t really want to attain it – aren’t willing to pay the price, devote the time or have the true burning desire to accomplish our goals.

No wonder then when we fail and keep going back for more as Thomas Edison did 10,000 times before inventing the light bulb that we are saying I really want to accomplish that goal no matter how long it takes.

People have said to me “It must be so nice to be your own boss and have your own business” to which I have to shut my mouth to keep from saying, “I work 7 days a week – I want to do this, I love to do this.  There is nothing easy about it”.

The secret is – if you can’t commit 2 months to making the change or forming the new habit you desire, don’t bother because you’re likely to fail.

The Two-Month rule does all the work for us – all we have to do is ask ourselves.

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I was fired as program director of a major market radio station once for succeeding too much.

The station was number one in teens and young adults but the station said they couldn’t sell that to advertisers so they axed me and brought in someone to attract an older audience.

It didn’t work.

The station went on to lose listeners and eventually did so poorly the owners sold the radio station.

Peter Laviolette is a Stanley Cup winning coach hired by The Philadelphia Flyers a few years ago to help them do the same thing. In his first year, Lavy took The Flyers to the Stanley Cup finals. Over the ensuing years, he did well enough to earn a raise and contract extension.

But something awful happened.

After losing the first three games of that new contract season, the team’s impatient 80-year old owner allowed this winning coach to be fired. Laviolette sat out the rest of the year and eventually signed with The Nashville Predators, which at the All-Star break this year had the best record in the NHL.

Lousy coach? Good coach?

These are just two of the many stories that we hear too often – perhaps you have one of them as well.

Getting fired when you’re doing the job – even doing a great job or earning a promotion.

In our venture capital/results now world, more and more people are becoming victims of bean counters who don’t even know what the people they are firing do so well.

They may get to tell you whether you have a job or not, but they don’t get to say that you have failed when you actually succeeded.

In fact, study any successful person in almost any type of career and you will see that along the way some damn fool doubted their ability to get the job done.

Don’t you do that.

I’m doing just fine.

Peter Laviolette has a shot at another Stanley Cup ring – a year ago when someone else decided he wasn’t the coach they wanted, he didn’t believe it.

And you will live another day to do what you do best.

Hire yourself every morning – and remind yourself why.

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Life is more stressful than ever.

We need to be the best, do the best – super-achieve.  And unfortunately we sell this snake oil to friends, associates, family and even ourselves.

And in the name of candor this hits close to home for me, as I am a perfectionist – guilty as charged.

Could you imagine saying that your children are cute, but they could be cuter.

Or that your friend is so loyal and caring but could be more so.

That your day on the beach was beautiful but if you didn’t have those two white clouds over the ocean, it would have been even better.

Thinking like this is pure insanity.

There are times in the day when pointing our shortcomings is worthwhile especially if you’re in charge of the wellbeing of others.  But not all day.

So, take the challenge I am taking for myself today – don’t try to improve anyone for 24 hours.

In fact, laugh to yourself when you get the urge and wonder how this poor person is going to go on without my perfectionist attitude.

Of course, they will and you will be closer to them.

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You’d think in the instant text-messaging world in which we live it would be impossible to not receive an answer to a text.

But it happens and it happens more than most people think.

No answer to your email or text, no problem.

No return phone call?  Why not?

But it may seem that when others want YOU to respond things are different.

What to do?

Here is a gem that may help.

People want what they cannot have.

They crave that which is often out of reach.  It’s part of the human condition.

So when you find yourself being ignored, take a step back and operate under the digital radar.  It’s not always on purpose but there is too much communication sometimes.

When I was a professor at USC I learned that no matter how much I prepared, or cared to teach the elements of the course, I could only do so when the students wanted to learn.

That was it.

Make them want to learn.

Same with relationships in the digital world.

Make them want to converse with you.  Just because we can doesn’t mean we should pound away until we get a response.

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The way not to win the approval of others is to spend your time trying to please them.

When trying to win the approval of others, look to yourself first.

The baseball great Ted Williams batted over .400 one season, something that has happened very infrequently in the sport.

But that means that 60% of the time, Williams was out – didn’t get a hit, didn’t help the team.

When we want to win the approval of others we must never try to hit 1.000 sucking up to them.

We must be true to ourselves.

Even when people do not agree, they seem to admire a person who is comfortable in their own shoes.

So today – just for one day – embrace yourself, make all that you are good enough without question, be confident of the gifts you have and even grateful for having them.

Then step up to the plate and do the best you can.

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The same reason we have to-do lists loaded with projects that take longer than a few minutes is why most of us have a hard time making meaningful life changes.

Big work to-dos take hours if not days, weeks or months.  Achievers know the key to completion is to break the project down into many little projects that can get closer to the end goal.

Same with meaningful life changes.

We want to be a better parent but that concept is so overwhelming it’s hard to know where to begin.

We want to be a better friend but it involves so much.  Where do we start?

We know we should live in the now to be happy but what do you do first?

We want to make a career change (or are forced to) but the thought is so overwhelming that it cannot be done in a few hours or even a few days.

Try this today.

Focus on one thing.

Only one thing instead of trying to change everything.

Be a better parent by helping children construct stronger boundaries – just one day, just one time.

Be a better friend by being a better listener for just one conversation not forever.  Forever cannot come before the first time happens.

Live in the now for one walk – around the block – concentrating on gratitude.  Just for a few minutes not all day.

And effect real career change by first deciding the one thing that will make you the happiest so you can take another small step toward the goal you just identified tomorrow.

Even small steps are big accomplishments.

And they feel just as good as swallowing up everything we want to do in one big move which, of course, is not possible.

Do something – anything – no matter how small and you have begun a meaningful life change.

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