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As a reformed social media abuser, I have significantly reduced my need to check my very few platforms to view who sees me, likes me, even loves me. Now, I only look once or twice a month to see the activity taking place in my welcomed absence.
Last week, however, all of these notifications kept banging into me. The little number in the upper corner of the app kept growing and growing. Fast forward to the end of the week and I decide to take a peek. Lo and behold, people were commenting on my work anniversary for Soul Patch Hippo: Success Coaching. Eight years. EIGHT! Is there a ‘Y’ at the end of that number? (Maybe it’s my age I’m thinking about…) If it wasn’t for all of you – my friends, family, colleagues, and most importantly, clients – I might’ve missed this auspicious occasion.
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33 days. That’s how long it’s been since I gave up social media and surprisingly I’ve lived to tell this tale.
Well, how did I get here? (Channel David Byrne’s voice)
Those pesky New Year’s resolutions — at least the ones we don’t abandon ten days after we make them – got me into this experiment. Among the changes I committed to start – and in some cases make permanent – was to give up social media for January. My version of Dry January.
Things I noticed so far:
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Based on the title, some of you – maybe as many as half of you – are incorrectly assuming this is a politically based piece. Coming off a very exhausting, contentious and important election year, I can see why you would think this. (Hint: Blue v Red) Another possibility is one that denotes a feeling or mood, the blues. Let’s lean that way.
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“It’s forgotten, we can move on.”
How many of us have been in a conversation that ends like that?
First, a little backstory. My family was displaced by the first of two hurricanes that visited the suncoast of Florida this fall. For those not familiar with Florida and its very distinct regions, the suncoast is the southwest coast of Florida, on the beautiful and fickle Gulf of Mexico. So…so what? Home to this year’s star storm dance partners; Helene and Milton.
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What guides you in times of chaos and crisis? How do you show up for uncertainty and ambiguity? At work and at home, with strangers and loved ones? Don’t wait and consider it until it’s “too late,” think about what you will change before that “next time” does materialize. Let’s not ignore the hippo in the room. Trust me, he’s there, and is taking up a lot of space. Let’s clean out that attic! Hippo first.
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“Boo was our neighbor…he gave us two soap dolls, a broken watch and chain, a knife, and our lives.” While watching the end to one of the 20th century’s great stories, I was captivated by a premise, a thing really, one that gets a lot of attention in today’s leadership circles – I’m talking about empathy.
“One time Atticus said, ‘You never really knew a man until you stood in his shoes and walked around in them.’ Just standing on the Radley porch was enough.”
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I am listening to a conversation about being nice vs. being kind and realizing a powerful message: these are not the same. Being nice is about being pleasant in a situation. The first definition in Dictionary.com is pleasing; agreeable; delightful: a nice visit. Kindness however requires much more active participation and deliberation. Kindness, IMO, is about love. Do I love this person enough to show them they are hurting others or themselves? Sometimes, we have to be tough to “show the love.” Alan Mullalhy, ex CEO of Boeing and Ford, called this kindness “management with love.” What makes his version…
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There are 3 main definitions of Like with 34 nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, and conjunctions, across those three. And one interjection. It’s that one interjection, considered informal, that I’m here to rant about. It looks like this… Informal. (used in speech, often non-volitionally or habitually, to preface a sentence, to fill a pause, to express uncertainty, or to intensify or neutralize a following adjective): So, like, why didn’t you call me? The music was, like, really great, you know? I’m not going out—it’s like 10 degrees out there! Like stick a fork in my eye please. Like it or…
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During the recent Independence Day celebrations that were all around us, the word or value that kept coming up for me was Freedom. A value that seems to lose its meaning and impact as new, younger generations emerge. While that topic is a whole other blog for sure, anecdotally I have experienced a serious lack in the understanding of what freedom means and how it impacts one’s life. Freedom and its plural – freedoms – are simple, not easy to truly acquire and super easy to lose. The opposite side of this is Groundhog Day. (Side note: this is one…
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“I’ve got a big call this morning. Really big. The biggest. Let’s all get on a call 15 mins before and get everyone’s roles straight so we knock this out of the park!” Okay, how do you think that big client call went? Not bad? Pretty good? Great? Or, it could’ve been better, there were good points, I didn’t see that coming, let’s regroup and set up another call. Or maybe, that really was not good… This is about show prep. What’s show prep? If you have ever been involved in the theater, as an actor, director, producer, stage manager…
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