Why Not Flourish?

"We keep moving forward, opening new doors, and doing new things, because we're curious and curiosity keeps leading us down new paths." – Walt Disney

I've always been a little curious, but with my renewed interest in reading my curiosity has gone into overdrive. A recent gem was a gift from my amazing wife, The Psychology Book. It explores the field of psychology from the founding fathers to modern psychologist in easy to understand language with relevance to everyday life. One of the psychologists featured was Martin Seligman and his book Flourish. His focus is on people's strengths rather than their weaknesses.

Here are a few of his exercises:


Use Your Strengths

• He suggests taking the VIA strengths questionnaire to assess your strengths and then to think of ways to use those strengths more in your daily life. There are several other assessment questionnaires on his website such as the Grit survey to measure perseverance. I took the VIA and my top strength was creativity. It was very enlightening and helped me better understand my current habits. I realized I have been tinkering with my triathlon training to satisfy my drive for discovering new and better ways to do things. Unfortunately it was my only creative outlet and led to too much tinkering. Since taking the questionnaire, I am now exploring other ways to satisfy my desire to be creative such as cooking and encouraging others (exercise #3).

Three Good Things

• Another exercise is to think of three good things, each evening, that happened and why you think they happened. In other words, what went well and why. I've done this exercise before, and I like the twist of exploring why. Research on the traditional Gratitude Exercise has shown improvements in sleep, happiness, illness, and a host of other benefits. The exercise forces me to view each day as a positive and reminds me of the small steps that lead to each accomplishment. I worry less and focus more on the controllable process.

Active Responding

• Exercise #3 is active-constructive responding. It is where you react in a visibly positive and enthusiastic way to good news from someone else. At least once a day, respond actively and constructively to someone you know. Celebrate with them. Ask them to relive the event. This is not an area of strength for me. My focus is typically on myself and making myself feel good. However, Seligman points out that emotions are contagious. When other people are happy and you celebrate with them, you can't help but feel better. It reminds me of Bandura and his research on confidence. Seeing other people achieve success helps you believe you can achieve success. Seligman also points out that being pessimistic is as bad for your health as smoking 2 packs per day of cigarettes. Luckily happiness is more powerful than sadness. So far this exercise is a work in progress, but has given me a distraction from my own worries.

Savoring

• Once a day, take the time to enjoy something that you usually hurry through (eating, showering, walking, etc.). When it's over think about what you did, how you did it differently, and how it felt compared to when you rush through it. This exercise of "living in the moment" has shown me that joy is all around. Sometimes I look for specific "things" to make me happy, but that ends up limiting my happiness to only a few moments in life. Plus those moments don't last forever. I wait and wait for the weekend, only to have it pass so fast. By slowing down I have also improved my patience and self control.

Make a Decision

Poop Or Get Off The Pot.

I have a tendency to over-analyze situations and delay decisions. Tiffany hates this about me and is routinely telling me to just pick something. On the flip side, I don't make the mistake of buying unsalted butter when I needed salted butter :)

In Anthony Robbins' Awaken the Giant Within, he describes life as just a series of decisions. Nothing is fixed. "You have the power right now to control how you think, how you feel, and what you do. Everything you could ever want, tangible or not, is all within you." In other words, we are not victims of circumstance. We have the power to change and shape our destiny.

Unfortunately we delay decisions to avoid pain or find the perfect solution, which ultimately makes the situation worse. We look for that perfect choice, but in reality every choice has pros and cons. Mike Rowe, from Dirty Jobs, answered a fan's request for help finding the perfect job with: "Stop looking for the right career..focus on what's available...you can always quit...happiness doesn't come from a job."

Blunt but true. The great entrepreneurs from John Jacob Astor, Andrew Carnegie, Cornelius Vanderbilt, Henry Ford, Mary Kay Ash, Ray Kroc, & Bill Gates all took risks and that is why they succeeded. Some decisions worked out, while others didn't. John Maxwell says, "The greatest mistake we make is living in constant fear that we will make one." John Jacob Astor, America's first multi-millionaire, initially came to America with the intent of selling musical instruments, once in America he sold fur, then opium to the Chinese, then invested in real estate in New York. He was flexible and moved forward.

This fear that we avoid is a concept, a prediction, that only resides in our mind. It keeps us from living in the real world and recognizing that life is not so bad. George Kohlrieser encourages us to "Put the fish on the table. It's smelly and cleaning it is messy work, but you get a good meal in the end." Decisions can be scary and intimidating, but in the end there's always benefits as well as the opportunity to make another decision. Have desires and dreams, but avoid fixations. "Suffering is the frustration of our desires and expectations." - Siddhartha Gautama (Buddha)

Challenge for the week: THINK, DECIDE, DO

What Makes People Great?

What makes people great, is it talent or effort? I've seen athletes who were carefree and seemed to get by with minimal training and I've seen athletes that appeared to need every minute of training. In Talent is Overrated, Geoffrey Colvin argues that it is neither.

• It's not IQ or Memory

Colvin says there are international chess masters who possess below average IQ. It's also not the result of an innately strong memory. Individuals with average IQs, who started out recalling 7-8 digits spoken aloud, have been taught to recall over 100 digits. In the realm of business, IQ is a decent predictor of performance on unfamiliar tasks but once a person has been at a job for a few years, IQ predicts little to nothing about performance.

• It's not Experience

Experienced Physicians were no better than Physicians with only a few years of experience at diagnosing problems. If fact, some of the older Physicians were worse. Just because someone has been working at the same company for decades does not mean they are any more an expert. One could simply find a comfortable routine and never challenge themselves or advance their skills. This is scary because the half life of knowledge is shrinking. Depending on the field, what we know today will be obsolete in 4-7 years.

• It's not Innate Ability

Mozart and Tiger Woods are poster children for innate ability. However, when one looks closer they both had fathers that went to painstaking lengths to teach them their crafts from a very young age.

The Answer is: Deliberate Practice
It's about taking specific steps to achieve a goal. It's not about doing everything well, but doing a few things really well. That's why IQ doesn't really matter. You're only focusing on a few small things. Jerry Rice, the Hall of Fame receiver, wasn't the best athlete, but he focused on a few keys areas to succeed. He didn't just play more football or watch more film, he studied the film using a specific protocol to better understand defenses. He also did specific uphill wind sprints to improve his explosive acceleration.

At the Music Academy of West Berlin. The good, better, and best violinists all practiced the same amount of total hours, but the best violinist committed more time to individual practice. It was the least popular form of practice, but it allowed them to focus on specific areas for improvement.

In a crazy story that could only happen in the 1960s, Laszlo Polgar advertised for a wife to help him prove that geniuses are made not born. He had 3 daughters and he taught them all to become internationally ranked chess champions. His daughter Judith reached the status of top female and top 10 overall.

Develop a Plan

Steve Martin regularly recorded his stand up routines and later listened to specific aspects of the shows to make adjustments. It's not a matter of just wanting something and trying really hard. It starts with having a belief/goal, that is broken down into specific steps, and adjusted through feedback. Panasonic developed a 500 year plan that has helped them over the years prepare for the future. Currently they are working with Tesla on a $5 billion factory to make next generation car batteries. On a personal note, I've added weekly feedback sessions with my wife to assist in writing my weekly plan. It's helping me stay on track, achieve my goals, and reduce stress. My next step is to develop a 90 day and 5 year plan.

Supportive Environment

Interestingly, Colvin noted that the great Einstein, Gardner, & Stravinsky all came from smaller cities. He hypothesized that being a big fish in a small pond helps develop confidence and future success. Malcolm Gladwell touches on this subject in David & Goliath. He found that some students become demoralized and lose passion when they go to a prestigious universities and compete in a bigger pond. I discussing this topic with a friend who attended MIT and he felt that social support plays a huge role in who succeeds and who quits. It makes me think that more people could be great if we just encouraged each other a little more and focused our feedback on specific behaviors rather than personal traits. 

Passion

Colvin concludes that greatest comes from Passion. However, in contrast to popular belief, passion is not fully formed at birth or sudden bestowed, it develops over time. It comes from the fulfillment of being good at something, being told your doing well, making progress, or receiving rewards. The rewards can be extrinsic at first, such as money or a trophy, but to maintain the passion one needs continuous intrinsic motivators.

My Take Aways
Praise someone/yourself today and see what passion is ignited. Even the most minute progress could eventually evolve into greatness. Secondly, ask yourself what do you want and what do you believe? If you don't believe something is possible, passion is not going to develop. In the end, "We may not become Mozart or Jack Welch, but we could become better." - Geoffrey Colvin