Remember that diplomacy is the art of letting the other party have things your way.

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The head and heart often get mistakenly assigned to the wrong task.

• Think with your head
• Feel with your heart
• Not the reverse

“The heart is forever making the head its fool” — François de la Rochefoucauld.

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Adversity can actually strengthen friendships as George Washington pointed out:

• “True friendship is a plant of slow growth, and must undergo and withstand the shocks of adversity before it is entitled to the appellation”.

• We earn the right to be a friend – friendship is not just a feeling – a good or great feeling – it is much more. 

• I love this definition of a true friend: “Your friend is the man (person) who knows all about you, and still likes you.” (Elbert Hubbard)

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“I must not fear.

Fear is the mind-killer.
Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
I will face my fear.

I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path.
Where the fear has gone there will be nothing.

Only I will remain.”

— Frank Herbert

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Just because people are quiet, doesn’t mean that they don’t have something to say.

And being talkative doesn’t mean you do.

• One of the most advanced and potent human relations skills is to listen to the other side of silence.
• That which is not said, but can be valuable if we listen for it in others.
• Listening to the other side of silence requires a sensitivity for the whole of another person without prejudgment.
• Being seen and heard does not just apply to expressing ourselves, it’s about establishing a healthy line of communication.

“I’ve begun to realize that you can listen to silence and learn from it. It has a quality and a dimension all its own.” – Chaim Potok, The Chosen

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My neighbor died suddenly recently – she was 50 years old, a husband, two children – one week away from starting college – it all makes no sense and is hard to comprehend.

• The Dalai Lama reminds us of a saying in Tibetan: “Tragedy should be utilized as a source of strength”. From strength comes acceptance.
• “The shattering of a heart when being broken is the loudest quiet ever” – Carroll Bryant.

• For survivors, help – Keeping a person alive in our memories requires no more than taking the thing we admire most and spending a lifetime living it.

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I had a student tell her classmates that she was more than willing to forgive a friend who hurt her after she got back at her!

• Hey, forgiveness is not for them, it’s for you – By letting go, you are able to avoid becoming the person you don’t like.
• But there are limits – people who abuse are better left out, no need going there.
• Forgiving is not forgetting so by letting go of the anger, you are not disregarding the problem but letting it go.

In the end, all of us have control over the person we want to be and while forgiving sounds magnanimous, it is self-preserving so that we stay on track to be the person we want to be.

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One of my students favorite assignments is when I ask them to write a paper and give themselves a pat on the back.

• It’s easy until this happens – They can easily write what they are proud of doing but can’t resist criticizing themselves before they are done (which is not the assignment).
• Getting rid of the guilt – Just being able to say they did something well seems to come with guilt which is of no benefit to anyone.
• The magic is to own the compliment without detriment and believing it.

Let’s face it we are competent – sometimes awesome – and recognizing that without limits is the lesson we should be teaching ourselves for that which we have earned.

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The greatest baseball player of all time – Ted Williams, the only person to have a season’s batting average of over .400 said a wise thing worth remembering.

“Baseball is the only field of endeavor where a man can succeed three times out of ten and be considered a good performer”.

• Redefine success – That suggests that we might be better off to define what success really is before getting started.
• Not reaching perfect isn’t failure – No one, not even Ted Williams, bats 1.000 and that’s ok – in baseball, a player hitting .250 can be a multi-millionaire with a long career.

Lift the burden off your back and shoot for perfection but judge success by a more realistic standard.

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Sports fans cringe when their teams suddenly stop winning with a passion and losing with apparent abandon.

• Slumps are normal – Everyone goes through them, so why do they get out of hand and give the feeling you’ll never win again – you don’t have to be an athlete to experience this.
• Pressing makes things worse – In sports the bat sticks to your hands, you grip the hockey stick too tight – it’s the opposite of just playing your best.
• The answer – Firing the coach sometimes works in sports to release the pressure but the rest of us can’t fire ourselves so refocusing on how good we are when we are simply ourselves is a way out.
• It’s usually all in our heads – Just like when we’re on a winning streak and everything seems to go our way.  Patience, positive self-talk and times at bat can bring us back to excellence.

There is a new study that suggests music may hold the key to staving off cognitive decline.

• Older is younger – Older adults performed just as well as young people.
• Listening was enough – Former music training had only a marginal impact on the findings.
• Music keeps us young – Music either by attending live events, playing an instrument or simply listening appears to be the way we have been searching for to keep our minds sharp.

If you want to change your life for the better before the year is out, you don’t have do anything more than master the following four things:

• Please Forgive Me
• I Forgive You
• Thank You
• I love You

For more:  “The Four Things That Matter Most” by Ira Byock, M.D.

“To achieve great things, two things are needed: a plan, and not quite enough time”Leonard Bernstein

NOTE:  Cheryl and I are going to take a few days off to recharge our batteries before NYU resumes in-person classes again in a few weeks and the media industry revs up to end a challenging year.  This seems like a good time.  A good time to catch up on some stories you may have missed.   See you in a few days — Monday August 26.

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As a former radio program director, I still see the world as one giant radio station.

Instead of only posting your next big moment on social media, consider putting into rotation as one of your greatest hits of all time.

Those moments are worth rotating over and over.

Some are even worth rotating more often than others.

And, as in music radio, play the things that make you happy in life.

I’m fond of a record industry saying:  if it’s in the grooves, it’s a hit.

Replay yours often.

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Forgiving doesn’t mean forgetting.

It doesn’t always mean reconciliation.

You’re not doing it for the other person.

Forgiving is necessary for all healing starting with you.

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An influencer platform known as Fanvue has conducted a beauty contest of sorts that gave out prizes to 3 non-existent people.

This is the part of AI – which also has a good side – that is scary.

Because the focus is on someone’s concept of beauty in a world that struggles with self-image and body positivity.

I’m taking this as a gift – and a warning – to look for the inner beauty of everyone and avoid outsourcing a person’s best qualities for what passes as an abuse of technology.

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Stanford Professor Mark Granovetter conducted a survey to find out how people in our lives help us to become more mobile.

His conclusion was fascinating:  about three-quarters of new jobs came from leads from people who were only seen occasionally or rarely and not from family or friends.

This reminds us that social mobility comes not just from those we hold closest but from other “weak ties” in our lives – teachers, former employers.

This morning this reminds us to put a new value on all people with whom we come in contact and not just the trusted closest ones.

In other words, you’re more likely to accomplish your goals by not asking your closest friends.

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The evidence is there, and governments are taking action where parents are not or cannot – there’s a lot of social pressure for kids to have phones when they are too young.

The two biggest school systems in the U.S. – LA and New York City are set to ban phone usage from bell to bell.

For what it’s worth, I’ve been doing this in my NYU classes and the students like it so much they often mention the positive aspects for going analog for a period in their assessment of the courses.

The U.S. Surgeon General wants warning labels on social media apps – kind of like warnings on cigarette packages.

Help is on the way and oh, by the way, young people are often critical of their parents for setting a bad example of phone distraction, but as the digital revolution advances, it appears there is some ray of hope for how to interact with it and maintain healthy habits.

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“Because the only thing in life that’s really worth having is good skill … Good skill is the greatest possession. The things that money buys are fine. They’re good. I like them. But having a skill [is the most important thing].”

That’s what Jerry Seinfeld told Esquire when they asked him why he still works – he’s making his debut as a director in “Unfrosted”.

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“If we only wanted to be happy, it would be easy; but we want to be happier than other people, which is almost always difficult, since we think them happier than they are.”  Charles de Montesquieu, writer/philosopher

This is why Instagram and social media detracts from our happiness because judging our happiness based on the perceived happiness of others always leaves us wanting more.

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