best laid plans

You can see the image of how you think you want it to play out.  You may even go so far as to live in that made up illusion for a while.  But eventually you wake up.  Eventually someone pinches you, or something breaks or comes crashing down, and you open your eyes and realize that what you wanted to build doesn't exist and by trying to live in it, you are actually missing out on what is right in front of you. 

2009 in summary

I can't exactly say that I am sad to see it go.  I mean yes, in lots of ways it was a tremendous year for me.  But there was a fair amount of disappointment and heartache too. 

2009 you started out with a newly found freedom, the freedom to discover, what I wanted, what I needed, what I loved, what I hated.  The world was full of hope and expectation and excitement.  Early on I learned that brutal honesty is the best policy, that it prevents a lot of pain.  I learned that gracefulness is key and people's feelings and emotions should never be toyed with. 

Spring came and with it the drudgery of work, the endless snow and ice, the lessons of short term sacrifice for long term gain and that even if we work really really hard for something, we don't always get what we want.  But there were sparks of new beginnings, an idea that was taking shape with a friend, and someone who showed me a small piece of what I had been missing all these years.

Summer was trying, weather in the Buf was beautiful, but I struggled through learning important lessons about standing up for myself, about true leadership, about how egotistical, self centered and selfish people can be.  It some how continues to surprise me.  But at the same time I got to have a wonderful time with a good friend, she was there to help me process, to be on my team and to encourage.

Fall....hummm...ends and beginnings.

Winter:

• Why am I still in this God forsaken frozen city! Patience and the ability to suffer for long term goals.
• Reflection - having dated someone who checks all the superficial, lifestyle and family boxes I realize that while that makes some things a lot easier, he didn't fulfill me on a deeper level and I couldn't trust him.  So now I am reevaluating, what is it that I really need to make me happy?
• Excitement - 2010 I think will be good, I am excited about building things 
  

Justifying selfishness...

In order for marriage to be successful, before you get married you have to be completely selfish and after you get married you have to be completely selfless.

Fork lift driver fail

Ditto

In the spirit of humor

more laughter = better leadership

Highlights from an HBR Article:

Social Intelligence and the Biology of Leadership

by Daniel Goleman and Richard Boyatzis

Leading effectively is, in other words, less about mastering situations—or even mastering social skill sets—than about developing a genuine interest in and talent for fostering positive feelings in the people whose cooperation and support you need.

Mirror neurons (neurons that enable us to mirror the actions and emotions of those around us) have particular importance in organizations, because leaders’ emotions and actions prompt followers to mirror those feelings and deeds. The effects of activating neural circuitry in followers’ brains can be very powerful. In a recent study, our colleague Marie Dasborough observed two groups: One received negative performance feedback accompanied by positive emotional signals—namely, nods and smiles; the other was given positive feedback that was delivered critically, with frowns and narrowed eyes. In subsequent interviews conducted to compare the emotional states of the two groups, the people who had received positive feedback accompanied by negative emotional signals reported feeling worse about their performance than did the participants who had received good-natured negative feedback. In effect, the delivery was more important than the message itself. And everybody knows that when people feel better, they perform better. So, if leaders hope to get the best out of their people, they should continue to be demanding but in ways that foster a positive mood in their teams. The old carrot-and-stick approach alone doesn’t make neural sense; traditional incentive systems are simply not enough to get the best performance from followers.

Here’s an example of what does work. It turns out that there’s a subset of mirror neurons whose only job is to detect other people’s smiles and laughter, prompting smiles and laughter in return. A boss who is self-controlled and humorless will rarely engage those neurons in his team members, but a boss who laughs and sets an easygoing tone puts those neurons to work, triggering spontaneous laughter and knitting his team together in the process. A bonded group is one that performs well, as our colleague Fabio Sala has shown in his research. He found that top-performing leaders elicited laughter from their subordinates three times as often, on average, as did mid-performing leaders. Being in a good mood, other research finds, helps people take in information effectively and respond nimbly and creatively. In other words, laughter is serious business.

Full Article:

HBR article on social intelligence, psychology and leadership.

Control Top Pantyhose?

I like to be in control of my life. I mean who doesn't, ok, so there are probably some out there. But me, I like to be able to call the shots, be in the driver's seat, run a tight ship, etc..etc..

Not in a domineering feminist way, but in a "I like to know what the big picture is so I can figure out where I am and what I have to do in relation to it" kinda way. After all, I am an architect who needs to see the beautiful skyscraper.

Admittedly I am slow to see all the steps that get me from the drawing board to the finished product. It takes me a long time because I am able to see all the possible options and catastrophes that could ensue from choosing the different options available. My parents used to say I was bad at making decisions. I would argue that I am slow, but not bad. Slow because I have to take every option to its end game (you should try playing board games with me!). I also consider other peoples' feelings and how each outcome may affect them. This can eventually get paralyzing, especially when my wants and emotions conflict with someone else I care about. It takes me a very long time to work up the nerve to make a decision that hurts someone else.

But back to control. Hurting my back has left me feeling less in control. I want to make it better and can not. I want to go running and can not. I want to put on pantyhose and I can not. I want my dog walker to be gay and to get along with the lady on the first floor...you can guess how that is going. I want to find a really great man...

Unfortunately as hard as we try and as badly as we want to, we can not control others' decisions, and we can not control fate, or God, or chance, or whatever you would like to call the other force that is at play in the world. I will call it God, because somewhere deep down that feels right. I would like to will people to do things, to try and get them to come to the same decision that I want to make, but it doesn't usually work. I gave up trying to will God to come to the same decisions that I wanted in about 2006 after my first year of marriage. That is about when I stopped praying (at least in the traditional sense).

Prayer...preached as quiet time with God, or listening to His voice, or communion, nearly always turns into trying to convince God to make the decision we want. It is funny, I found I become better at listening to God the more I moved away from organized prayer. Ironically, organized prayer puts God on our terms, demands Him to fit into our schedule, puts us in control. I think God teaches us most things through our circumstances and through other people. If you think of it this way, listening to God, is just that, listening...while going about our days. When we try to control situations to fit our wants and needs, we stop listening. It is like trying to have a deep conversation with your spouse while there is an infomercial on in the background going on and on about that new car that you REALLY REALLY want. Turn off the TV and practice some good reflective listening skills....

Personal responsibility and reward for our actions...I love it

Individual incentives - Washington Times

oh, and a bit about how unhealthy our jobs and lifestyles have become.

Focus, focus, refocus

Pain....I have definitely covered this topic before. Probably the last time I was hurt. Pain has a way of focusing you. First it focuses you on it, then it focuses you on the things you want to do but can't because they hurt.

Lots of focus, but definitely not on the things that I need to focus on right now. There is this giant excel workbook that is staring back at me and I am trying to will it to finish itself. It is not going so well.

Why is it that now that my back hurts a lot all I can think about is wanting to go running. Actually that is morphing into really wanting to go swimming, just cause it seems like it would feel really good. But of course I can't get to a pool because I am stuck in the Buf. :(

So it seems to me that I have been hurt and sick a lot this year. That could partly be due to the fact that I have been working out more this year, but not consistently because of travel. However, the first year I was married I was sick and hurt a lot too....coincidence? I think not.

I know stress tends to manifest itself in physical ways for me. And I think part of my problem this year is probably stress. I think I am also getting old. Oh God! Yeah well not old, but older. And I have to realize that I can't just start and stop physical activity anymore. I have to stretch and I have to eat right and I have to take care of myself.

Interestingly enough the employees of the acquisition of my current client are under a tremendous amount of stress. The whole senior leadership team has had to have chest X-rays this past month. It is bad! So this made me think, at what point do our jobs start to kill us? Actually, physically kill us.

In one way I feel bad for complaining because I look at the generations before us and the conditions and jobs that they endured. But then I realize that in some ways our jobs today are probably equally unhealthy just in less obvious ways. My job consists of sitting, a lot. I sit on airplanes, I sit at desk chairs, conference chairs, in cars, in hotel rooms. I probably sit for at least 12 hours a day. If I didn't get up to go to the bathroom and get water, this sitting would be mostly uninterrupted. I stare at little text on a dimly lit screen, also for about 12 hours a day, sometimes a lot more. I carry my heavy luggage around, I breath in airplane exhaust, I eat fairly well, but still not lots of fruit and veggies, I get to work out only sporadically, or at least not with a consistent, base building repetition, in the same gym with good equipment, I spend 12 hours a day staring at a gray fabric wall under florescent lights, in a mold infested building. Now that the winter is approaching I will never see the sun. Etc, Etc...Oh and then there is the stress. So I guess it really shouldn't be a surprise that I am sick and hurt a lot. (Is it any wonder why I am a proponent of green building standards?!)

We know why we do it. $$$, or the security that $$$ provides. One of the senior leaders of the acquisition told me that he thinks about quitting and then he goes home and his kids come running up to him and he knows he can not. When he said this, I couldn't help but also think about the fact that he just had a chest X-ray done. When framed that way, it hardly seems worth it.

The world turns

I had coffee with a friend this past Friday and we were talking about relationships and she said something that stuck out and has stuck with me.

"There will be a guy for whom the world can not turn fast enough for him to get to you."

We were talking about how to know if a guy is really interested in a relationship. It is a common belief that women over analyze their relationships. Wondering what this thing their guy said or did meant. "Is that good or bad?" "Does that mean he's interested or not?" I have decided that it is true, we do over analyze relationships. Because if we really have to wonder, if there really is that shaky feeling in your stomach, then the answer is no, he is not interested in a more long term committed relationship. (Isn't this a book or something...?)

Deep down we know this is true, but we still over analyze because we are hopeful creatures. We want to keep the hope alive and in analyzing we might be able to find something hopeful to which we can cling. Having hope feels good, or at least we think it feels better than not having hope and going back out there into the scary world alone.

I have seen guys who have found the girl for which the world can not turn fast enough for him to be next to her. I know how they act. I want to be that girl to a guy whom I admire, trust and respect. Sometimes it is hard to keep the hope that it will happen someday.

Architecture

I am an architect. It has taken me a while to realize this. I wanted to go to school for architecture. I applied to a couple of architecture programs, but did not get in. So I went into biomedical engineering, but I am not an engineer, so I transferred into organizational theory. So on and so forth....

I have continued to have a fascination and love of architecture and have on a few occasions been tangentially involved in design, but it was not until recently in my professional career that I realized, that being an architect best describes the way I see the world, and problems specifically, regardless of whether or not I actually draw buildings.

When looking at a problem I first like to get a lay of the land. Then I like to get a picture in my head of what the end product looks like, how it will be used , what its limitations are, what are the things that take top priority, what color is it, what does it feel like, how does it make you feel. Once I know these things, I can work backwards, (we have to have this door here, so therefore this window goes here, etc...) to develop plans. In both business as well as in my personal life, I tend to design around use and beauty. I like simplicity and will not sacrifice function.

Once I have complete plans drafted, I can get to work building. Like in a real life building, I like to do this part step by step. First, site prep, second, the foundation, third the steel structure, etc, etc, and finally the finish work. I get flustered when people try to mix up the order. I also get flustered when people try to rush though building the foundation and core structure. I see these as the most fundamental, and critical parts of the process, that which everything else is based on. I also get flustered because I can still see the final product and can clearly understand how it is impacted. Similar to architects I am interested in building things that endure. Things that are classic, adaptable, functional, beautiful, and purposeful.

Not everyone works like this. In fact I think many of them ended up in the architecture field, and not in business. It seems that sadly today many businesses are not built for endurance, beauty, steadfastness and functionality. They are mobile homes instead of bungalows, McMansions instead of brownstones.

House Design Ideas

humm...feeling the urge to look at pretty things that I would love to have in my home one day...
a great NYC apartment. I love the calm and neutral colors. I also love the orange circle painting, and love the tile work in the bathroom. I would love to do my bathroom like that. Simple, black and white, possibly with a tan and black floor tile.

Apartment therapy Michael NYC tour

Inspiration

I had a little epiphany last night while I was out running. I have been thinking a lot lately about what it is that really attracts to me a man. I know I have talked a lot about this throughout this blog. It it is good thing to apine on is it not? :) I have talked a lot about all my boxes that need to be checked and about the "one thing" and humble strength and all that. All of these are good things. I have another thing to add to the pile.

The man has to inspire me.

I can't quite find the right words to capture the enormity of this for me, but I think that if I distill down all the things that I have talked about in the past, this might be the one thing that I can't live without.

I am inspired by:

• a man who has strong principles and values and sticks by them
• a man who will stand up for himself, his friends, his family and me
• a man who will fight to protect what he believes in
• a man who has bigger dreams than I do
• a man who volunteers
• a man who is more organized, focused and dedicated than I am
• a man who is more forgiving, patient and understanding than I am
• a man who sets goals for himself and follows through
• a man who makes me want to be better
• a man who encourages me to be better
• a man who is consistent and steady
• a man who is respected and liked by his peers

It is funny that my original list of boxes I need checked touches on most of these things, but doesn't quite frame it like this. There are also a lot of boxes that I now realize are very secondary. While it would be nice to have these boxes checked, if the above mentioned items were present, these secondary boxes would most definitely be things that I can live without.

Why do dreams get lost?

Overwhelming discouragement

We get lost

Other things become more important

We forget them

We forget what it feels like to realize a dream

We are the type of person who is perpertually hard on ourselves, so we only see the failures

Constantly striving, so we move onto the next dream before the first is realized

We are a scattered mess

Not believing we deserve that dream, we settle for less

I realized a really big dream this week: To own a home. I have thought about it for a long time and been looking for places for a long time. It hasn't sunk in yet. Maybe when I go and lay down on the floors and run my hands along all the walls and sleep there and eat there, then maybe it will be real. But it is so funny how I am already moving on to the next dream, without really enjoying the fulfillment of this one. Typical. I spend a lot of effort thinking about the dreams that are impossible, or at least currently unattainable. For this one I am going to try to take it slow and enjoy it.

Slacker

Yes, I know, it has been ages and ages since I have written. So sorry. All my loyal readers probably stopped checking my blog now and I will have to completely re market my self. Alas, I have been writing, it is just that the things that I have been writing about were more suited to going in my handwritten journal than out on the web. That is quite a statement for me, since as most of you know, I have been pretty open about lots of things on this blog. But most of the things that I have posted about in the past, were, just that, in the past. And I had processed them and the other people had processed them, so while they were humbling, they were at least mutually known.

The things that I have been writing about lately are not mutually known, so I don't really want the various people who are involved to find out about my thoughts through my blog. So therefore you all will have to wait to hear.

On other exciting news, I have new digs, and I expect that I will be hanging out in these digs for longer than 9 months (my average homestead for the past 6 years). I have great plans for the new digs, and in the spirit of Apartment Therapy, I will be posting photos of all my work. Very soon I will post photos of the "Before" trust me it is a great "Before" as the place needs a lot of work. Right now it smells like stinky cat and has stains on the ceiling from an old roof leak. The toilet is pink porcelain and the stove is from 1964. So I definitely have my work cut out for me.

Additionally, I gave up on the triathlon ambitions for now, as getting to a pool has proved almost impossible. So now I am focusing on a duathlon. I can handle running and biking. I am aiming for one on Oct 25th. So I would love to post about training schedules. I am trying to put one together now.

Today

Focus..focus...chimney...focus...focus...kitchen cabinets...focus....focus...couch....focus...focus...apartmenttherapy.com...focus...focus...roof deck....focus...focus...mortgage application...focus...focus...paint colors...focus...focus...oh what the hell, why am I even trying.

Boxes, boxes everywhere.

Continued from previous post: (as in read that one first)

So I was wondering....
I am now having the experience of meeting someone I really like and I am finding myself frantically looking at my boxes and seeing which ones he might fill and which ones he might not. Then Monday I had a little freak out session with my work roommate in which I talked about the boxes that might not be filled and she talked about all the boxes she has to fill (she is moving cross country next month from her apartment where she has lived for the last 13 years).

Insights from freak out session:
1. Perhaps I am just really terrified of another relationship, because to me relationships represent pain, sadness and disappointment
2. Perhaps I got a little carried away with my boxes
3. Boxes don't fill themselves, bastards!
4. Attics and basements swallow boxes whole!
5. Closets also swallow boxes whole, but then they vomit them back up about a week before you have to vacate your apartment.
6. Perhaps I am getting way, way, way ahead of myself
7. You can usually determine whether the boxes that make up the "Would be nice to have" list are filled early on but the really important boxes, like "Encourages you to fulfill your dreams", take longer to know. (In short, it takes time to get to know someone, you can't make snap judgements on the most important elements of their character in a week or two)
8. Booze makes boxes get filled faster (both boxes)
9. Friends make boxes get filled faster
10. Perhaps, filling or not filling boxes is not what we are dealing with here

Well Damn it! I thought I had completely processed all emotions surrounding my past, I thought I was so mature and had so successfully rebuilt the walls around myself that I was completely safe from ever falling off the cliff again. But could it be that I am so terrified of repeating my mistakes that I am not allowing myself to even peek at the view from the top?

My cardboard fort with walls a hundred feet high, so I would never have to worry about screwing up my and some nice man's lives again.

The thing with making boxes is that then you have to fill them

Cardboard boxes.

I think only when we are kids do they represent fun. Once we can't fit ourselves in them anymore, they quickly come to represent one of the most hated rituals of adult life: moving.

It starts with procuring the cardboard boxes (no small feat in a city without a car), then taping the bottom, then filling them with just the right combination of stuff so as to not break anything, including your back. Then the filled boxes have to be moved, or stored, and then they have to be unpacked, or in my case, when you move 10 times in the past 10 years, you eventually give up unpacking and they sit in the corner of your living room. Ah boxes!

About a month after leaving my husband I sat down and made a rather extensive list of qualities or character traits that I wanted in a spouse. I was reasonable, I categorized the list into "Must have", "Want to have" and "Would be nice to have". I accepted that I probably couldn't find everything, and I wanted to be realistic about the things I would compromise on and the things I wouldn't.

I tucked the list away in my journal and didn't really look at again until November when I started working on developing a target identification model for potential bank merger scenarios for my client at work. Basically I took a bunch of criteria for banks and weighted the different criteria based on my client's needs and then ran the targets' data through the model and it spit out a score for each target. Of course I was like "Ha ha wouldn't it be totally great if I did this with my own target criteria". (Sick MIT student, sick, sick). Thankfully I got busy with other things, and didn't attempt such craziness. However, I mentioned my casual stroll to the edge of the cliff of nerdom to a classmate (while we were on a date) and we got into a pretty good discussion.

I argued that having a list of boxes that need to be checked is a really good thing, cause it makes you evaluate a potential target fairly and objectively before you fall (or jump) off the cliff. He argued that while having criteria is good, usually for him there either is chemistry or there isn't, and you may have really great chemistry with someone who doesn't fill all the boxes, and you may not have any with someone who does, that is just the way love goes.

At the time, I thought "Silly boy who hasn't had a relationship with LOTS of chemistry for the first year with someone who didn't check any of the boxes completely destroy your life." But now I find myself wondering if he was on to something....

continued in next post....

The 2 fears that drive relationship decisions

1. The fear of being alone
2. The fear of being with someone who would make you unhappy

Things about these fears:

• They act in opposition to each other
• Everyone ascribes different weights to these fears when making decisions
• The weights people ascribe to these fears changes through different points of life
• Number 1 is the root cause of relationship decisions where people stay in relationships they should not
• Number 2 is the root cause of commitment issues
• Past experiences heavily determine people's fears

More Good things about Marriage

Again possitive thoughts, although most of these are not based on experience, but hypothetical and/or from friends in wonderful, loving relationships:

1. Someone to be completely naked with
2. Someone to work hard alongside
3. Someone who isn't affraid to put you in your place when you need it
4. Someone who knows how to encourage you when you need it
5. Someone who has your back
6. Someone who pushes you to be your best and to reach goals you never thought you could
7. Someone to build things with
8. Someone whos eyes are your mirrors
9. Someone to dream with, who understands your dreams, and who shares your dreams
10. Someone who actively participates in making your dreams a reality

Choosing Courage III

Sometimes you do what is courageous because you do not want to be consumed by your fear. Possibly you are running from fear, but more likely you are plowing through it head first.

Sometimes fear is so immense that if you stopped and thought about it you would be paralyzed. In these cases, don't think, just act.

Learning to trust yourself again

I used to think I was a pretty good judge of people. That I could get a sense of what they were about within 10 - 15 minutes of meeting them. I have had to realize that this is not the case. In fact I take a very naive view of people and generally give them more benefit of the doubt than they deserve. Basically, I don't judge them, and try to hold off forming my opinion of them until I get to know them well. In fact, if I manage to think that you are a bad person after 10 - 15 minutes of meeting you, chances are that you are total and complete asshole, because seemingly those are the only people that I can make a fair thumbs down judgement on that quickly.

These total and complete assholes are thankfully not the majority of the population, but that leaves a whole lot of people who are just assholes, that I don't recognize and in fact believe to be generally nice. Sort of the innocent until proven guilty stance.

I suppose I am too trusting and I don't intentionally play political games with people, so I don't expect people to play them with me, and consequentially I get blindsided when they do. I am slowly and sadly learning that I am actually not that great a judge of people. I have made a couple of massive mistakes, most notably with men, or at work. And I have had to reevaluate my abilities.

Since I have now lost trust in my abilities to judge people, I am affraid of trusting people in general, for fear of getting really hurt again. I fear that I will get too deeply involved with someone, to the point that I will loose my ability to step back and objectively evaluate them, then they will hurt me. How does one overcome this? Because really you have to just jump in and allow yourself to get to know someone. How do you do both? get to know someone and maintain a certain objectivity that allows you to judge their character, values, beliefs, morals, etc. so that you can protect yourself if they are not who they first portray? I don't know yet, but working on it....

Choosing Courage II

Is it still courage if you don't have any other options left?

Yes, partly because even if you are finally faced with a situation where you have no alternatives, you had to make a series of decisions that led you to that place. And even if each of those decisions was not necessarily a defining courageous act, to finally stand where your only option is courageous tells me that each of those decisions was a small step in that direction.

More interesting logic...

Given a certain situation, maybe you always have more than one option, but some people don't even see all the options because based on their values, upbringing, strength of character, the options that would go against these things never even enter their mind.

Choosing courage

Sometimes you do what is courageous because you have run out of all other options.

Some People are lucky, others have to make their own luck

I am not lucky. It is ok, I have come to terms with this fact. Some people are lucky. They seem to glide through life getting everything they want with seemingly little effort. I have had to realize that I am not one of these people. At first I was a bit annoyed, maybe jealous, even angry. There is the temptation to wallow in defeat and be the victim of your own life. But then I put on my big girl panties and manned up (how is that for an interesting mix of sayings).

After realizing I am not lucky I figured out a few things:
1. There is no sense crying about not being lucky, cause you can't change it.
2. People who are not naturally lucky, are not doomed in life, they just have to make their own luck.

Ah ha! More on this later, need to work now.

The really good things about marriage

1. free massages

2. someone to snuggle with every night

3. sex - the freedom of knowing that even if you royally screw up you will get to try again the next night, and the next, and the next, until you figure it out

4. Someone to cook dinner with and for, someone to eat with

5. Someone to go out to breakfast with

6. Sex: for women - whenever you want it; for men - probably more often than you are getting it when you are single

7. Someone else to live for

8. A welcoming smile when you get home

You can't always get what you want

I was taught from a very young age that if you worked hard enough you could accomplish anything. I think it is true, in most cases. However, I have had to realize that even when we work really really hard, and we want something really really badly, we don't always get what we want.

I am one who also likes to hold out hope. Hope in spite of unbelievable odds, hope when it defies logic and reason. So it takes me a long while to finally confront that I really am not going to get what I want. Sad.

As the song goes... You get what you need. I am not yet convinced of this....I suppose only time will tell.

Convergence

Continuing from the previous post....So while I was thinking about the Tricia Sulick online marketing campaign that I was launching, I had coffee with a good friend, and we started talking...

She, interestingly, backed up my sense that people who try to maintain two (or more) images don't seem to do it very well. We specifically talked about our experiences at business school. She mentioned that she didn't feel like she knew many of our classmates very well. Besides a few close friends, she said there was this weird disconnect with people in business school. You knew almost nothing about where they were from, what they valued, what their families were like, and what things they had gone through. It was like people had two years to craft an image of themselves. This image could be completely from scratch, and pretty self contained. Classmates never had to know that they were the fat kid in dodge ball, or the skinny, dorky math counts champ (and lets face it we went to MIT, we were all at least one of these, if not some funny combination of both).

There are a few ironic things about this. First, in hindsight our classmates seemed shallow and disconnected from themselves, not exactly the makings of the great leaders they were trying so hard to be. Second, people worked so hard to create a professional image and didn't share "personal" details about their lives, values and backgrounds, but then they would go out, get completely wasted, and sleep with three classmates in the course of a week. I mean WTF?! So it was ok to drink till you threw up, and make unbelievably stupid decisions while you were drunk in the name of partying hard, but it was not ok to talk candidly about divorce, or to honestly admit failure? That seems pretty messed up to me.

A lightbulb went off....

I took this completely amazing class as an undergrad called Person Centered Leadership with a really terrific professor Jeanne Plas. By forcing us to be completely candid in front of a classroom of strangers, she made us realize that the strongest leaders are the ones who do not have multiple images, or personalities. They live their lives seemlessly integrated. The reason they are such powerful leaders is that they can make decisions from their gut because they are so in tune with what they believe and value and they never have to question whether it will fit in this or that image. Additionally, people are drawn to them because they are genuine. People trust them because they feel like they are getting the whole story. And people like being around them because there are no pretenses.

I know some people like this. I know some classmates like this. In fact, they come easily to mind, and the greatest thing is that I knew from within about five minutes of meeting them that they were the kind of people I wanted to follow, work with, be friends with.

I want to be one of these people.

Converging

So I have been doing a lot of thinking lately around what kinds of things to share with the public, and what exactly is the right forum for discussing issues that are not clearly "professional" in nature, but that I think are important for people to talk about. I have also had a number of good conversations with friends around this topic and I realized that this discussion/thinking is really at the heart of my blog and why I started it in the first place.

All of this started when I did a post on this blog that was quite personal in nature and a friend of mine wrote me that I should take care about the things that discuss in a public domain. He didn't necessarily say I should not share, he just said that I should understand and craft the image that I am portraying to the world at large, and probably potential future employers/employees/investors.

This really bugged me at first. The post was talking about some lessons I learned about relationships, and I felt pretty strongly that people need to talk about these lessons in order for others to keep from making the same mistakes I made. I argued that it is precisely this fear of tarnishing our image that keeps us from sharing our mistakes, learning from them and helping our friends keep from making the same ones. Hence my post on Denial below.

I did battle with myself about how to proceed. Did I want to continue to share my values, hardships, lessons and big mistakes in such an openly searchable forum with my real name attached? Did I want to write anonymously? What was the image I was trying to portray to the world, to potential employers, to potential boyfriends, to whoever knows how to search for patricia sulick on google?

I realized that I was not ashamed of anything I had writen about. I was sometimes brutally honest, candid, and lets face it, when I make mistakes I like to make big ones that are pretty publicly humiliating and/or life changing (hey, go big or go home). But that being said, I had to think about what the people reading my blog would think of me, and whether I liked the potential consequences of that. Yes, people are quick to judge and bring to the table their biases and pre conceived notions. Humm....

I also realized that I had a huge opportunity in front of me. I am a bit shy in person. I am a terrible interviewer (and first date with someone I like). I am an introvert and I get nervious and that makes it hard to be myself and to share what I really think on the spot. I am generally much better at expressing myself after I have had time to think and usually better at writing down my thoughts than speaking them. Thus, my blog represented a really great opportunity for me to share things about myself and for people to get to know a little bit more about me in a forum that I was better with.

So I decided for the time to put the more personal posts in an anonymous blog and to think some more about how I wanted to weld this new found power...

Thoughts

The glory in life is not in never falling, but in getting up every time you fall.
-many famous people

It is a good thing for leaders to know when they are appreciated
-one not so famous person

Procrastinating

It is a talent of mine.  Maybe a talent of everyone.  Putting off the things that we don't want to do.  Sometimes putting off things that are, in and of themselves harmless, but they are related to something or some outcome we don't want.  

I am doing it right now, writing this blog post instead of packing and cleaning my apartment, because I don't want it to be Sunday night, and I don't want to have to leave tomorrow morning, and it was so incredibly beautiful here today, and the city is still beautiful and warm and alive, and I have to leave my dog, and the pool and running by the river, and friends and my really comfortable bed, and my Apple computer, and yummy food and.... ok, I'll stop, cause this is just making it worse.  

Denial

Definition

a defense mechanism, in which a person is faced with a fact that is too uncomfortable to accept and rejects it instead, insisting that it is not true despite what may be overwhelming evidence. The subject may deny the reality of the unpleasant fact altogether (simple denial), admit the fact but deny its seriousness (minimisation) or admit both the fact and seriousness but deny responsibility (transference). The theory of denial was first researched seriously by Anna Freud. She classified denial as a mechanism of the immature mind, because it conflicts with the ability to learn from and cope with reality.

Types of Denial

Denial of fact: This form of denial is where someone avoids a fact by lying. This lying can take the form of an outright falsehood (commission), leaving out certain details in order to tailor a story (omission), or by falsely agreeing to something (assent). Someone who is in denial of fact is typically using lies in order to avoid facts that they think may be potentially painful to themselves or others.

Denial of responsibility: This form of denial involves avoiding personal responsibility by blaming, minimizing or justifying. Blaming is a direct statement shifting culpability and may overlap with denial of fact. Minimizing is an attempt to make the effects or results of an action appear to be less harmful than they may actually be. Justifying is when someone takes a choice and attempts to make that choice look okay due to their perception of what is "right" in a situation. Someone using denial of responsibility is usually attempting to avoid potential harm or pain by shifting attention away from themselves.

Denial of impact: Denial of impact involves a person's avoiding thinking about or understanding the harms his or her behavior has caused to self or others. Doing this enables that person to avoid feeling a sense of guilt and it can prevent him or her from developing remorse or empathy for others. Denial of impact reduces or eliminates a sense of pain or harm from poor decisions.

Denial of cycle: Denial of cycle is where a person avoids looking at their decisions leading up to an event or does not consider their pattern of decision making and how harmful behavior is repeated. The pain and harm being avoided by this type of denial is more of the effort needed to change the focus from a singular event to looking at preceding events. It can also serve as a way to blame or justify behavior.

Denial of denial: This can be a difficult concept for many people to identify with in themselves, but is a major barrier to changing hurtful behaviors. Denial of denial involves thoughts, actions and behaviors which bolster confidence that nothing needs to be changed in one's personal behavior. This form of denial typically overlaps with all of the other forms of denial, but involves more self-delusion.(source: Wikipedia.com)

Banks, foreign relations, credit cards, relationships...
Why do we all work so hard to avoid short term pain when the long term consequences are so much more vastly difficult to deal with?

Instincts and bad decisions

Instincts, we all have them. Bad decisions, we've all made them. Theoretically (at least on some level) one is supposed to keep you from the other. But as I am sure all of us can attest, that is not always the case.

But let us disect that conclusion a little.

I am going to argue that with many bad decisions, our instincts do tell us to do otherwise, we just choose to ignore them and make the bad decision anyway. Yes, of course there are exceptions, but generally if I look back on the many, many bad decisions in my life, right before nearly all of them, I felt this funny twinge in my stomach, and I didn't listen!

Why do I ignore this time tested signal? Do I really think this time will be different than all the ones before it? Do I really think that the accumulated knowledge, or reason, or common sense, or just plain fear that combine to create a surge of adrenaline that causes my stomach to do a flip flop will be wrong? Why can my "rational" brain overpower my "irrational" gut, when usually my "irrational" gut is right? I mean WTF?

I think maybe it is not quite that simple.

Pain II

Sharp, shooting, knife pain demands instant action. Reflex like responses make us cower or change position or flee. That is pain that is easy to know what to do with. The cause and effect are closely and obviously linked.

Dull pain that creeps around the edges, that stays in the shadows and gnaws, that we fend off, that we can feel coming nearer, that waits for our weakness, a crack in the wall of protection we have built. That kind of pain is much harder to figure out. The cause is often hidden, or delayed, or it is caused by some habitual action that we don't even realize we are doing.

How do we overcome this cowardly pain when it doesn't want to show itself? Must we let ourselves be weak, let the pain over take us, see what comes of feeling it? To do so feels like giving up, this being weak and succumbing to the pain. But maybe that is the only way to overcome it. We can not keep up the walls, I know we don't have the strength for that, and the pain is too much of a coward to come out and fight, so maybe surrender is the tactic.

Surrender?! Is it so ingrained in me to think of feeling an emotion as surrender. Emotions are meant to be felt. Pain is a very useful and instructive feeling. Why Why Why!!?? Do I see it as weakness.

There have been more than a few yoga classes, where at the end of the class during the last 15 minutes when we are quiet that I have lost the battle to fend off the pain, it all comes crashing in on me. Probably the only 15 minutes in my week that I let down my guard. Scary, but ultimately healing. Another common time is at night when I lay down just before I fall asleep. Sometimes randomly (thankfully this is pretty rare) last week when I was waiting for water to boil, or in response to a song I hear on the radio.

I realize that this maybe is kind of a dark post, but it shouldn't be, right? Pain is something we all deal with everyday. It shouldn't be hard to talk about.

Pain

So I hurt my back about a month ago. I first hurt it in college and ever since the same injury seems to crop up every couple of years. Usually it gets better within a week if I just rest. However this time, I have not been resting, I have been trying to continue training for a triathlon. My back doesn't hurt when I am running or biking or swimming, so it wasn't hard to keep doing those things. But it has continued to hurt when I am not working out. So this week I told myself I was going to take the week off and let myself get better. So far it is not working. I am frustrated that my back still hurts, and I can't seem to figure out how to make it better. I want to know what I can do to fix it (I suppose I am kinda like a man that way).

Additionally I was just starting to really enjoy training and now I don't have an outlet for my energy and work frustrations. But I really really want it to feel better, so I will try to be patient.

The worst part is the last few days it has been worse not better. I can't figure out if it is from sitting at a desk all day, or if the working out actually was helping my back in some ways and maybe I just need to find the right combination of workouts to make my back better. Grrr...

One good thing I have learned is that the most likely reason for me hurting my back in the first place. So that is good for the future, I know what I need to work on to keep it from happening again. However, I just want to feel better now. Funny though, I don't want to take advil because in my mind that is just masking the problem and not allowing me to work with the pain to try and figure out how to fix it. However pain makes me cranky and I mostly want to go home (not travel) so I can go swimming and get a massage, and maybe even see a doctor (however extremely unlikely given my schedule).

So that is my whining for the day. Interestingly enough there are so many great lessons to be taken from what I just wrote. Bet you can't wait to read them :)

The Silver Lining

So every Monday my coworkers and I have Silver Lining Lunch, where we list off the things that are either good about being staffed in Buffalo, NY for the winter, or we try to think of places that would be worse. Our funny little ritual emphasizes the importance of finding the positive in our lives.

I grew up thinking that life was generally good and bad things only happened every once in a while. However over the past year, I have done a 180 on this topic and now am pretty certain that there is infinite capacity for sad or bad in our lives and much more limitted capacity for good things. Therefore it is crucial that we celebrate the good. We have to accept that the bad is going to be there, always in the background, and that there will always be the potential for more bad, but we choose to focus on the good.

There are many examples of people who went through terrible things, like cancer or loosing a spouse, things that you would think covered them for life. But then something else terrible happens to these same people. Stories like these remind me of two things

1. the enduring human spirit - the sheer strength that humans have to overcome tragedy
2. life's infinite capacity for bad and the absolute choice we must make to celebrate good

Celebrating good is a choice. One that we must continually remind ourselves of. Because for whatever reason we focus on the bad when that is exactly the opposite of what we need to be doing. We must look for the silver lining.

Adventures in Between

One of my classmates was inspired to start blogging on her job search in the worst economy in decades. I am sure lots of other good things will creap into her blog too. Check it out.

adventuresinbetween.blogspot.com

Fake vs. Real

I have the extreme privilege of being friends with a number of really great guys.  On occasion they have man night.  I believe a much needed and under appreciated (by women) time.  I was lucky enough to be invited to man night last Thursday.  I say lucky because mixed in with the nearly constant chatter about breasts, there were some interesting insights into relationships, dating, and most importantly the differences between fake and real or shall we call it Date vs. Marry.

For a long time I was taught that the sole purpose of dating was to see if someone was the one you were to marry.  You were not supposed to start dating them unless you thought they were a potential marriage candidate, and as soon as you knew you didn't want to marry them, then you were supposed to break up.  

I now realize there are other philosophies to dating.  A friend told me last summer that he had had some really great 3 month relationships and there was never any intention of them being any more than that.  At the time I don't think I had any reference to understand what he was talking about, but I now believe he might have been on to something.  My friends at Man Night echoed this "not just about marriage" dating philosophy.  When a group of attractive women walked in to the restaurant, my male friends quickly decided they were in the date category, which upon further inquiry, actually meant that they were just interested in having sex with them.  The girls were physically attractive enough to interest my friends in sex for a short time, but there was not enough else to them to keep my friends interested for life.  

Men seem to be able to switch back and forth between date vs. marry fairly effortlessly.  Furthermore, they seem able to quickly assess their targets.  Women seem to get muddled up, often thinking a guy who is clearly in the date category could potentially be in the marry category.   

Additionally, while there are boys who will always just be looking for date girls, the majority of men are looking for both date and marry girls simultaneously.  Men can also switch back and forth between being a date guy and a marry guy.  Girls on the other hand, seem more likely to fall into either one category or the other.  I suppose, for better or worse, I am a marry girl, that is why I have a hard time thinking about dating someone I know right from the start doesn't have all the characteristics I would want in a husband.  Not that I won't go out on dates with men, I just find it hard to imagine being in a relationship with someone once I knew there was something about them that was a deal breaker.  Likewise, I would have a hard time having sex with someone once I knew there was something that was a deal breaker, I know what that feels like, sex without making love, sex knowing it is over.  But I don't want that, it is not worth it.   

 

There are many people in this world who do not inspire you to follow them, the majority, I would say. There are many cowards, many liars, many cheats, many who simply lack the cahones to stand up for their team, who will do what it takes to make themselves look good, even if it means screwing over those who help them.

When you find someone who you would want to follow, who you would want to have your back, to be fighting next to in the trenches, someone you trust and who inspires you, you should hold onto them, or work with them, or whatever is appropriate. Actually I am thinking about this mostly in the context of my professional life, but it also seems to apply to personal life.

The ideal boss, like the ideal husband, a perhaps mythical creature. But is it? I mean why is it that the S&*% floats to the top? Is it because we let it? Is it because we do not demand more? We do not set high enough ethical, moral and quality standards for those we are willing to dedicate our lives to?

"It is just a job"

But it is not just a job. The people I know spend 80 - 100 hours a week at their "job". They travel four or more days a week. They sleep in hotels rather than in their beds with their husbands or wives. They give up working out and taking care of themselves. They dedicate more time and energy on these "just jobs" than anything else in their lives. So it seems fair to me to demand that this job that we give so much to, should at least be something we believe in and are inspired to do. And furthermore, if we work for someone, we should hold that person to standards that are equally as high as the standards we have for ourselves.

Proper Cloth

So one of my classmates and core team mates Seph Skerritt bucked the I-Banking and consulting trend to start his own custom dress shirt company.  It is a fabulously hip and stylish place for men to get outfitted for whatever life throws at them, so I thought I would mention it:

http://www.propercloth.com

definitely check it out.  

Humm...I realized I didn't post anything on valentine's day, so here goes a make up post.

Valentine's day, as much as people try to tell me that it doesn't matter if you are single on valentines day, that your dad and brother can be your valentines, and it just means you share warm fuzzy feelings with everyone, I found the holiday a bit hard to take.  

As much as New York is a city of stylish, single till they're 40, career men and women, Boston is a city of adorably casual, athletic, couples with dogs, or kids, or both.  So Boston celebrates Valentines day with an impressive display of picturesque romanticism.  Think couples rolling out of bed to brunch, then hot chocolate and ice skating at the Commons, strolling down Newbury, or Comm Ave, dinner at _______ (fill in the blank with quaint little gourmet restaurant), culminating in stopping by Deluca's to get firewood for romantic snuggle in front of fireplace.  It was a bit overwhelming, even for me, who is not usually phased by this stuff, and is quite definitely on a I don't want any part of settled coupledom kick. 

Next year I think I will get out of Dodge.

 

Love and Excel

Hilarious quote from my friend Andi Bishoff on Facebook:

"Love is like a goal seek function with only one variable to make the whole mess work."

I don't happen to believe that there is only one variable, but perhaps only one type of variable.

Painting and Yoga

Painting

Even an incredibly talented artist depends on the quality of his materials.  If he is given mediocre materials to work with, his work will never be as spectacular as if he is given the best quality paints, brushes and canvas.

Yoga

The really wonderful thing about yoga is that you have to completely concentrate on what you are doing, so you have an hour and a half of not thinking about all the other crap in your life.  You are forced to live in the moment.  The hard part about yoga is then taking that quality of focus and deliberation to the other areas of your life.  If only we could all live more in each moment of our lives.  To be completely present in every conversation, interaction and task.  People who are able to do this have a tremendous power about them.  They make the people they are around feel special, energized, cared for, listened to, peaceful.  

New York City

So I am killing some time in JFK terminal 5 and had a few thoughts on relationships.

So I was scanning the available men passing through terminal 5.  I admit I enjoy comparing the different men in the different places I travel, and I was excited about NYC, because, well, it is New York, home to beautiful, powerful people.  

However tonight I was sorely disappointed.  A fairly constant stream of beautiful women strolled past, but the men mostly looked exhausted, stressed out and prematurely aged.  Maybe it is just me, but I was pretty glad to live in Boston :)

While we are on the subject of travel and attractive men, can I just say that in all my many years of traveling and many many flights, I have never once sat next to an attractive, single man.  I always end up next to the fat people, the families with three kids, or the deathly afraid of flying.  Why me?  Why me?

Elemental

I was privileged enough to get a fleeting glimpse of where the kind of desire that exists in long term relationships comes from. We all are told that beauty fades, power, prestige and material possessions come and go, we hear over and over again not to base our desire for someone on these things.

But, do we ever know what to base our desire on? Where does it come from if it is not in response to an incredible body?

My answer is that true, long lasting desire is based on one thing, and that one thing is different for everyone. In all cases it is some unchangeable element of a person's character. Some fundamental part of who they are, something so ingrained that no matter their social standing, religious beliefs, wealth or any of the other things that may shift during the course of their life, that element of them will remain. I am learning to distinguish the element of a man's character that is most desirable for me. I have a sense of it, but it is still hard to define. In words, humble strength. In feelings, that which makes me feel like it is ok to be weak, to let go, to relinquish, a trust in his strength, a knowledge that he could do all that is needed, but that he has the confidence to not need to boast about it.

I was talking to a date last week who was quite emotionally mature and we started talking about this idea of what drives long term desire. I asked him what this thing was for him, and he said that it was empathy. I thought that was an excellent one. For him a women displaying empathy is the sexiest thing in the world. I also thought that it was impressive that he knew what I was talking about, and had so distilled the emotion. Most people our age have not done this and have no idea what I am talking about. I wish people didn't have to go through what I went through to learn. I wish our culture celebrated these true elements of desire rather than fleeting and false desires.

Humility

Love is humbling.  Is one ever good at it?  I don't know.  

It seems that just as soon as you think you are good at it, or have it figured out, it puts you right back in your place.  So perhaps the one quality of someone who is good at love is that they are humble and understand that they will always be learning about love.  

"Men are what and who they do" 

"A man has thoughts and then these thoughts manifest themselves in the man's life.  Therefore a man becomes later, what he thinks now."

-Gentlemen sitting next me to in Starbucks this morning

Differences between men and women

Quote from a recent date I was on:

 

"Men fall in love with the women they are attracted to.  Women are attracted to the men they fall in love with."

I agree.  But there does have to be that initial physical interest to get the conversation started, even for women. 

I have now also discovered that it doesn't take terribly long to figure out if you are not attracted.  It is good to give it a few dates, but you have a pretty good idea by then.  Things are either getting better or they're not.

Love is eternally hopeful.  Hopeful in the face of extreme adversity.  Hopeful even when the odds are a million to one.  Hopeful even after defeat.