How can you expect to lead others if you can’t lead yourself? This post, like most of mine, is about leadership. If you can’t lead yourself, how can you expect to lead others? If you don’t understand your emotions and motivations and how to create the ones you want in yourself, how do you expect to do so with others? Alternatively, the better you can lead yourself, the better you[…] Keep reading →

Sometimes readers write with questions, suggestions, and feedback. It helps me improve what I write for them. I value what they write and use it to improve my writing. I don’t yet have an experienced editor. What you’re reading is better for what they shared. Based on that, plus the principle in my post “Sharing what you love fills your life with sharing, love, and stuff you love,” I can’t[…] Keep reading →

In this blog I try to cover what I consider one of the main skills of leading others and yourself — the ability to manage your emotions no matter what comes your way. It shows up in many ways. One of the simplest is the phrase I use a lot: Pain is inevitable. Suffering is optional. … as I wrote about in my posts “A model to handle pain” and[…] Keep reading →

I’ve written before about on opening up, allowing yourself to be vulnerable in business and personal relationships, and the risks involved, mainly to your emotions. Probably the most important one was on my experience that choosing to care about something and to act on that caring means you’ll hurt. And the more you care the more you risk getting hurt. I wrote that post, “Leadership, personal development, choosing to care,[…] Keep reading →

Last month the New Yorker wrote a defense of learning and teaching English. It says English Departments are under attack. What kind of fool would take on the magazine many call the best in English about English? I guess I’m that kind of fool. I wrote the following in the comments.  “We need the humanities not because they will produce shrewder entrepreneurs or kinder C.E.O.s but because … they help[…] Keep reading →

[This post is part of a series on people who succeed despite adversity. If you don’t see a Table of Contents to the left, click here to view the series, where you’ll get more value than reading just this post.] Ask yourself which helps more — having advantages or learning to overcome adversity? I base this series on noticing how many extremely successful people had problems that mediocre people claim[…] Keep reading →

When the topic of meditation came up the other day I heard the same thing I’ve heard many times before. I’m sure you’ve heard and said similar thing for similar activities: “Oh, I can’t meditate. My mind is too frantic. I wish I could.” Maybe you’ve heard or said it in this form: “Oh, I can’t go to the gym. I’m too out-of-shape. I wish I could.” or: “Oh, I[…] Keep reading →