ENERGY

PhotoCredit: Waffle

My mother sent me a link to a ‘golden buzzer’ performance from America’s Got Talent. It was the typically addictive golden buzzer performance that never fails to melt my heart. It felt good to watch something so positive and full of hope. 

I searched for the video this week thinking I might write about it. Thinking we could use a dose of hope and positivity. Wondering about it being a little too saccharine. A little too easy in a world that doesn’t feel so easy right now. As I searched, I found another video from AGT (I think that is what the insiders call it). Equally full of hope and positivity, it contained another ingredient. The most important ingredient. 

As Simon Cowell later noted, and it’s palpable, there is an unmistakable energy from the minute W.A.F.F.L.E walk on stage. What they did on stage didn’t really matter. Although it’s easy to say that because what they did was excellent. But I kind of didn’t care. They were electric. Electric in that way people get when they are really clear about what is important to them. Electric in that way people get when they are determined about their path in life. 

When you have that clarity, and alignment, you can fall or stumble and it doesn’t matter. You can get stuff wrong, and let’s face it we are all getting stuff wrong at the moment, and still be track to getting it right. Not that they stumbled - well not that I could see, they were moving around pretty darn quickly.

Such is the way of the entrepreneur, the student, the child, the athlete and the artist. Such is the way of the squiggler. Hopefully this is also the way we will choose as humans.

FIGHTING FIRES

PhotoCredit: FireTruck
We have an adorable almost-thirteen week old puppy in our lives. I say adorable, which he is ... for 5 minutes before and after he wakes up. The rest of the day he is either sleeping or veeeerrrrryyyyy busy. Busy with the curtains. Busy behind the mirror (that one makes my heart stop). Busy with the laundry. Busy doing unwanted carpentry on our furniture. BUSY!

So when he sleeps, we relax. We are not on active “where’s the puppy” duty. Our work is dictated by him sleeping. We get him in his crate and get him settled and creep out of the room and slowly, quietly, shut the door. We even turn the fan up to create white noise for him. We mean business.

And then, inevitably, a fire engine speeds by. Sirens blaring. Horn blasting. I have a moment of panic, and listen, but the little dude sleeps right on through it. He’s a true West Hollywood dog. When we eventually get him out to the countryside I am sure the quiet will keep him awake. We are raising a city-dog.

We get a lot of fire engines passing by our house. Sirens and horns blasting as they navigate through unforgiving LA traffic. Day and night. Sometimes way too late at night. There is a necessary communication of urgency. A warning. An alarm. They are designed to blast into the consciousness of distracted drivers. Designed to penetrate absent minds. 

Lately there have been a lot of sirens. The alarm has become alarming. As I worry less about my little guy sleeping, I worry about my city. Chipping little pieces from my heart. My mind races. Fire engines are usually first on scene; I hope no one is hurt too badly. 

It's not healthy, or helpful, to induce a state of universal worry at this increased frequency. So I have been retraining myself with breathwork and mindfulness. Trying to exchange my fight or flight reaction for awareness and ease.

There are so many places in our lives where we induce a stress response. Little sounds, certain times of day, or comments from our colleagues and loved ones that knock us from happily going about our day to melting into a state of anxiety. Anxiety that messes with our minds and our bodies. Anxiety that leads to distraction, fear and sadness. A very unproductive loop.

How could you shift your response to a trigger? Can you learn to breathe in a moment that induces anger, panic, frustration or alarm? We can take inspiration from firefighters themselves who are trained to have a non-stress response to an emergency. They know that they need to stay level-headed so they can assess and address the situation that awaits them. And while breathing works, so does putting on some noise cancelling headphones. Silencing your phone. Turning off notifications. Or, as a friend of mine suggested, mentally tell the annoying person to socially distance and “far cough” (say it out loud). Then laugh to yourself. That works too.

DAY DRINKING

PhotoCredit: Bubbles

I have been thinking a lot about habits and routine lately. Being stuck in one place for over three months will do that to you. Usually I blame my frequent traveling for my lack of routine. Right now I have nothing to blame but my inner rebel. 

A coach I once worked with said that when you are trying to adopt a new habit there are two reasons you fail. Either you are a brat - lacking the commitment and discipline for change, yikes! Or you are a wimp. I am not sure that “wimp” was his word, his point was that you were avoiding confronting the challenge.

Double Yikes.

It’s a stark contrast from one of my favorite books on habit “Daily Rituals: How Artists Work”. Daily Rituals is a book best described as delightful. It comprises a series of one-to-two page examinations of how the Greats of the past did their great things. From Immanuel Kant to Toni Morrison to Ernest Hemingway. The bite sized accounts make for a quick and inspired read. A great way to start your day.

Daily Rituals is ultimately a treatise on the importance of singular focus on your craft. None of the Greats did their work by accident. Gertrude Stein noted that while she was generally unable to write much more than 30 minutes a day “it makes a lot of writing year by year.”

It’s something James Clear speaks about in Atomic Habits. The cumulative effect of a lot of little focussed actions. It is also, as we know, the core ingredient in the power of compound interest.

Most contemporary books on productivity and vocation are harsh in comparison. Requiring stringent adherence to stated rules, to a routine of repetition, and to a level of, frankly, rather dehumanized existence. It all smacks of deprivation. And it all starts to get rather boring and joyless.

Joy feels like a hidden secret to motivation and productivity that few “modern” thinkers explore. A pursuit of the more human elements of eating and socializing and exercising could be considered a life well lived. In turn we have made all these about restriction and discipline and judgment. 

Daily Rituals instead delivers a more human wisdom. Yes, we must attend to our vocation. We also must walk daily, spend significant time with friends, ensure that we eat well (there was a lot of focus on food as routine) and, evidently, to drink quantities of alcohol. Mostly not day-drinking but this was no group of rule-followers.

Call me a brat or a wimp but previously any attempt at a routine eluded me. I was trying to force-fit endless productivity into the hours of 5am to 9pm without boundary. Without consideration of friends and food and the frivolity of life. Covid-19 enforced zoom calls with friends, baking, eating, drinking a little more wine than usual, and lots of #puppylife. It’s forced a more human existence. I like it. 

Now I make sourdough crackers at 6am while a furball plays at my feet. I answer emails while holding one end of a rope toy, with a growling mischief tugging at the other end. And I write, or think, in moments like this one. With the little dude passed out in his crate. The world whirling around us both. A moment I appreciate more because it’s a moment. It’s not a monotony of endless hours where I must be must be productive. 

And do you know what? I think I am getting more done.

For Reals.

SILENCE

PhotoCredit: BlackHeart

I wrote my blog during the week in a fit of productivity. Given the events of the weekend nothing I wrote seems relevant. It’s feeling a little hard to know what to think let alone what to write. We spent the weekend in some sort of vortex of vortex’s with riots seemingly surrounding us. Helicopters and sirens were the playlist of the weekend. A pandemic wasn’t enough. A war zone had erupted around us. 

I never feared my personal safety but, that said, I didn’t feel safe either. Which seems fair enough given the ignition point of the riots around the US. A significant number of fellow citizens don’t feel safe on a day to day basis.

It’s not ok. It’s not ok that any human doesn’t feel safe. In society or, for that matter, in the workplace.

One of the strongest messages from the weekend is that silence is not ok. I struggled with this. Honestly, I don’t know what to say. Harder still, I don’t really know what to do. I did the only thing I knew I could do - I went out to my neighborhood shops and just felt the impact of the insanity of the prior night. I watched as glass was swept up, beautiful stores were destroyed and businesses were boarded up. My heart broke as one of my favorite stores had every beautiful item, every treasure, smashed to pieces. Not just things but works of art that became casualties of the mayhem.

I even watched, not realizing what I was seeing, as a man fled a store with his arms full of the last goodies that remained in an unattended business. In broad daylight.

We were doing what we could to help the businesses. Sweeping glass, checking in. Feeling overwhelmingly helpless in the midst of all the destruction. I feel more helpless in the midst of the broader issue of human rights and equality.

One store that lost everything had the presence of mine to post that, while they lost everything, it was replaceable and must not be a distraction from the true issue at hand. His intention was so clear. There is a broader conversation we need to have. Lives are not replaceable.

Let’s not miss the point.

As I have contemplated this moment in my life, in our life, I keep coming back to intention. There is much work to be done, yes, but it is also work we must do on a daily basis. The bottom line is that much of most of our days are not spent intentionally. We get busy, distracted, overwhelmed and unable to participate in society much more than an instagram post and a couple of zoom calls.

When our words and actions are not thoughtful - shit hits the fan.

I don’t have the answers. I barely know the questions to ask right now. What I do know is that how I treat my fellow humans will have impact. The simple act of reaching out over the weekend, much like we did at the start of the pandemic, has real impact. Kindness seeps out. Awareness creeps in. 

So if you are struggling with what to do, I have a simple place to start. Stay connected to yourself and stay connected to your people. Start there. From that place we will have the broader conversation with the compassion and impatience it deserves. And as you have other ideas, please let me know. This is the time for us to speak up and speak out.

WHAT'S LOVE GOT TO DO WITH IT?

PhotoCredit: Heart

We rocked out to Tina Turner this weekend after Husband discovered a video of her performing River Deep Mountain High throughout her career. Watching her become an icon over the years, and decades, is a tribute to the resilience we are all capable of. No matter what is thrown our way - we can come back bigger and better. Just as she did. 

It felt like a timely reminder and a timely moment to recognize the legend that is Tina Turner. And the legend of our own capability, come what may. 

Today is a great day for us all to get back to basics. Put a record on and let your inner rockstar out. Even if just for the 3.45 minutes of this video. You know you want to!

THE IDK

PhotoCredit: The Lorax

I’m really good at making things hard for myself. Finding the struggle in the struggle - on it! As I pulled a muscle in my back halfway through this whole quarantine situation I realized I hadn’t slowed down. I wasn’t traveling but I was rapidly filling the void. Work calls increased by an order of magnitude. Any other space in my life was filled with ordering supplies as if the apocalypse would be upon us any day now.

Three weeks into my injury and I am so over being restricted in my movements. Entering our third month of quarantine, I recognize the same frustration.

My back is holding me back from doing all I want to do. Covid-19 is a handbrake on the world. My back reflects the literal tension of this moment.

I see a similar parallel in recovery. I have been efforting myself to health. Each time I thought I was “fine”, suddenly I wasn’t. I spent any moment of relief doing laundry, cleaning, baking, and taking apocalypse inventory. I was deploying frustration to fix myself and, in the process, I was undoing any good I had done. My effort was removing any ease I had found.

True healing happens when we let go of our need for certainty and embrace the IDK. Embrace the I Don’t Know of it all. Certainty is rigidity. In our backs and in our lives. Not knowing affords a freedom. Freedom to seek information and not force a solution.

My back wasn’t damaged, it was stressed. I kept adding to that stress trying to push it back to where I was before. The truth is that my body is tired. Tired from years of effort. I forgot about ease. I forgot about the IDK.

I know my back is getting stronger, even in its weakness. I know our world is getting stronger, even though it’s hard to see what recovery will look like. I’m working on letting go of my frustration and allowing ease to emerge. I’m learning to embrace the IDK.

Glorious newness will emerge from this crisis and make us stronger as we find the ease of not-knowing.

START ALL OVER AGAIN

PhotoCredit: lucyflemingillustrations.com

This year started so well. I had a grand list of new things I was going to make happen in my life and at about 6 weeks into the year I was dialed in. Mid-February I went to New Zealand for work - well most of that trip was Sydney - and expected to be back in New Zealand in less than a month for my usual crammed start to the year. We were talking Covid, trips to some parts of the world seemed unlikely, but not down-under. Certainly not global lockdown.

I came back from that trip and life as I know it unravelled. Life as most of us know it unravelled. And I unravelled with it. Somehow cleaning and baking became more important than working on myself. Somehow cleaning and baking became working on myself. All my rules went out of the window - do the old rules even apply anymore? Life suddenly got a lot less complicated. All that was important was my daily yoga practice, baking (weird) and knowing what percentage of alcohol I should be spraying on everything.

And so I find myself at the start of May wondering what to do with my grand list? Wondering if I care about my list anymore? Wondering what I do care about anymore? Well, other than yoga, biscotti and disinfecting things. 

2020 always felt like an important year. So many of the companies I work with had 2020 as a landmark for strategy initiatives. It’s like somehow we intuited that this numerologically beautiful year would be life changing. But not like this? No! When we envision change and evolution we anticipate things going gloriously to plan. Champions rising to peak performance. Award winning marketing campaigns stirring hearts and minds to action. 

Real change is messy and awkward and uncomfortable. More puberty, less Cinderella. There are no fairy godmothers here. Well, I live in West Hollywood so to be fair there are a few fairy godmothers around - but they are all struggling with this too.

The World will find its new normal slowly and likely with some mistakes along the way. A few ill-advised outfit choices, a couple of bad grades and a lot of finding our limits. We can’t expect a linear progression of recovery; personally or for our economy. This is not a time to make a grand plan and adhere to it with precision like we know all we need to know. This is a time to experiment. 

The biggest resistance to experimenting is usually that we fear failing. Especially failing publicly. No one wants to get it wrong. But do we know what’s right or wrong in this moment? There are plenty of businesses who were somewhat following the rules who are scrambling to survive right now. So if ever the rules didn’t apply it’s now.

When I realized there was some unravelling happening I decided to put a new filter on my life. After a pretty shitty end to 2019 I decided my word for 2020 was “magic”. 2019 taught me that even in the worst of times we can find beauty and alchemy. So I decided that everything I did would be in pursuit of finding magic. Some days I do this better than others. Some tasks better than others. It’s work, but that’s the whole point - I am choosing what I want to actively cultivate in my life.

Which (or should I say witch) is how I am thinking about my list and the next two-thirds of 2020. This is a great moment to choose a word for the rest of the year that will help you transform and evolve. Choose a word, change your word, create a mantra - whatever feels right to guide you and support your actions.

Experimentation is action with intention. By my squiggly logic, if everything you do is grounded in intention the outcome of your actions isn’t important. It’s kind of a way to failure proof yourself. So you’ve really got nothing to lose. See ... MAGIC <wink>.

GAMIFY YOUR LIFE

PhotoCredit: PacMan

Where does all that extra time go? It’s the most interesting aspect of the quarantine to me. I have mostly avoided over-dosing on online yoga classes. Sure I sneak in the odd biscotti-making session when no one is watching. And there has been a slight over-consumption of re-watching the great British Baking Show. But I’m not traveling, I’m not commuting and I’m not going out to dinner in the evening. Where is the time going?

I sat down over the weekend to assess my schedule. I wrote out all the things I wanted to do in a week. How much time does each activity need? One hour of exercise a day. Thirty minutes of meditation. Try to reduce email to 90 minutes a day with a couple of catch-up sessions as needed. And. And. And. I added the total...to get 100 hours of productive time a week. I knew that wasn’t viable.

Back to the drawing board. I eventually managed a schedule that kept me occupied 5.5 days a week from 6am to 10pm. That seemed reasonable. 

Not. 

Of course I didn’t follow my overachieving insanity of a schedule. For starters, who over-schedules their Sunday? Second, I just plain didn’t want to follow it. I wasn't inspired. It didn't motivate me.

Then something weird happened.

I sat down at my desk and knocked out 80% of my scheduled items in a few hours. Interesting. 

Then I went for a walk and caught up on a couple of podcasts. The second one couldn’t have been more perfect - “The Case For Being Unproductive.”

Let me start by saying this goes against everything I stand for. I love being productive. I’m not going to stop analyzing my productivity. Like ever. However I am rethinking how I do that. It feels like a great time for us to all rethink how we “do productivity.”

The podcast reminded me of my favorite productivity rule, that a job will expand to fit the available time. Parkinson’s Law. I had less available time today and I still cranked through my tasks. The interviewee, Celeste Headlee also reminded me that we are a lot happier and effective when we are task-oriented rather than time-oriented. A focus on tasks is considerably more motivating.

Many self-proclaimed productivity guru’s, I mean coaches, would suggest that a focus on your most important tasks is the better approach. Back to rocks, pebbles and sand (or nerds and cream eggs for those of you who have seen my SquigglyTube).

Except this hasn’t been working for me lately. I need more than a list. Weirdly, the schedule is helping. I find myself back on track for my day after a meeting was cancelled and other things were faster to achieve than I expected. Full circle that became rather satisfying. My under-acheivement led me to overachieving. 

Like most great things in my life, the schedule created a game. In the video game industry we call this gamification - which essentially means you build in levels of achievement and rewards to a process. Can I “beat the clock” and get my tasks done while still leaving room to be unproductive? And by unproductive of course I mean cleaning, eating, baking and ordering stuff online - not at all in that order. I have 90 minutes allocated for XX task - can I get it done in half the time? It’s why I like the sprint process so much from the software development world - it turns a to-do list into a competition. Against yourself. My favorite kind...

When gamification and Parkinson’s Law come together there are endless opportunities for you to make your schedule work for you. Rather than you working for your schedule. So what game will you play this week?

DARE, DREAM, DO

PhotoCredit: Totoro

I was on a zoom call last Friday for my friend’s birthday. Apparently, this is what we do now. It was such a boost to see a collective of incredible women gathered digitally. There is no way we would have been able to coordinate this PreIsolation. IRL or digital. I drank a bottle of wine that night. I’m impressed my girlfriend could be such a bad influence from a distance. I am more impressed, quite frankly, I could drink a whole bottle of wine. Not so much the next morning...

Most of my zoom calls have been for work. I have been in “we got this” mode. No time for exhaustion. We have to make our cash work. We have to trim our overheads. Rethink revenues. Ask ourselves “what are the business models of the future? When will small businesses open? When will the US start flying again?”

I haven’t had time to think about what I was missing. As the “onwards oriented” person that I am, I hadn’t stopped to think about it.

Hugs seems to be the top-ranked collectively missed thing. Then uber-eats (for my friends in Level 4 lockdown). Dinner parties and drinks are next. Travel is the secret thing that no one wants to talk about. It’s pretty clear we will have everything else before travel.

No one seems to miss the daily commute. No one is going to miss being at home with their kids all day.

What I am missing is inspiration. Not that I am feeling uninspired. There just doesn’t seem to be as much space for inspiration. Innovation yes, we are working hard to think about what this new reality means to us, to our lives and to our businesses. But inspiration feels a little lost in the equation. I worry we have stopped dreaming. 

It is understandable. There is little room for imagination and creativity when you are homeschooling your kids; running an empire; keeping up with your Netflix binging; and participating in the baking-obsession that has taken over us all.

We are tired. This is boring now. We know why we are doing it - we know it’s important - but we all want to tap-out of this reality show we have all unwittingly signed ourselves up for. Or alternate-reality show!

I get it but I want more. And I want you to want more. So I have a challenge for you. A dare. Give yourself space to dream a little of what your future could look like. To think of something really big. Possibly a bit crazy. Something really different that you are almost scared to say out loud. 

Yes a lot of stuff isn’t working but, how could we find a way for those things to work? How could home schooling work? How could separation make us closer? How can we make the regeneration of our environment permanent? 

We will be through this in no time. It just feels like an eternity right now. We have a unique opportunity to reimagine what our future might look like. It’s precious. It’s a gift. And it has an expiry date.

Let your imagination come out and play for a while. It’s a quarantine-approved activity.

IT'S ALL SO QUIET

PhotoCredit: Bandana Girl

I almost got arrested yesterday. Well, that’s what the homeless man would have told his buddies. He was concerned that I was not wearing a mask. “It’s the law to wear a mask,” he said with deep concern across his face. He pointed to his shirt, a “Sheriff” badge embroidered on it. Dead-serious. I was more serious about him maintaining six feet of social distancing from me.

To be fair, he was correct. In LA we have been asked to wear masks in public. I dutifully oblige when I am going into a store but, I was out for a walk on Easter Sunday. Nothing was open. No one was around. I didn’t need a mask.

Moments after this encounter (which if it sounds scary, rest assured it was more comical than alarming) I came across a store selling masks. They had just received the shipment. Not N95 masks. Just some overpriced, cotton, basics. Still, it was good to see a supply of any kind of mask - much like I found it oddly comforting when the supermarket had hand sanitizing wipes back in stock.

These are lead indicators. Signs that some (even if small) part of the economy is functional. 

As Mark and I walked a little further along Melrose Avenue we passed the iconic pink wall outside Paul Smith. Any other Sunday the parking lot would be buzzing with tourists getting their ‘gram on in front of the wall. This Sunday it was emptier than the canned beans aisle at Whole Foods.

These indicators are heavily based on human behavior. No instagrammers coz no tourists. This tallied with my other lead indicator for travel; the distant view of LAX from my office window. I get oddly excited when I see a plane now. They are few and far between.

I am acutely aware I am watching out my window for signs of recovery.

And beyond my window. Whole Foods still has no yeast. Toilet Paper is in short supply. The N95 masks we ordered are still “shipping any day now”. People are still anxiety-baking, panic buying/stockpiling and our basic medical supplies are stressed.

But my favorite lead indicator, hustle and innovation, is showing positive signs. We are starting to see enterprise spring forth from the wreckage of the pandemic. This will continue and is one of the greatest signs of recovery. Innovation and entrepreneurship will support change, evolution and resilience. We will be stronger on the other side if we do this right. As we do this right.

Finding peace in the hard moments is work and it’s work that’s worth doing. What are you using as a barometer for your personal journey through the chaos? What are your lead indicators that help to keep you on track? A little observation goes a long way. 

BLUE CRUSH

PhotoCredit: Brady Knoll Pexels

Isolation feels a lot like swimming in the ocean to me. Some days it’s awesome; I feel alive, refreshed, meditative and energized. Other days every stroke feels like hard work. 

The ocean is ever-changing. One day it will work for you and the next day it will swallow you whole. It's the ultimate change-environment.

While being stuck at home might feel like the opposite of a change environment, it’s clear that nothing is as it was. Each day is oddly different, despite the monotony and the same-ness.

Yes, this will eventually normalize. The big question is when? Swimming in the ocean gets progressively challenging the longer you are in the water.

Challenge is a wonderful thing. So we can embrace this. We can innovate for ourselves and our businesses. We can come out of this stronger than we went into it.

We should absolutely set big goals for ourselves and make a plan to use this weird isolation time to do something we have always put off. My goal is to learn to do a yoga handstand. Being upside down feels about right at the moment. It also requires me to work on my balance. I need to do a lot of work on my balance.

But challenge can’t be constant. Drowning is a real possibility. I had to pull back on the handstands last week because I overdid it. I lost my balance in the bigger sense. Everything was hurting.

When you are operating in a change environment, challenge has two components. We need to assess how we are performing against our goal but we also need to assess what level we think we should be performing at. Most of us think we can operate daily at a 9 or 10. Or is that just me? And daily has now become all 7 days of the week - we have lost the separation of our weekends.

It is critical in a change environment that you give context to your capacity. Ask yourself, “what is my level today? Is it a 10, again?” 

We are playing a long game here. Check in on your goal, assess your performance and - more important - assess your capacity each day. Ask yourself what you need to do to move closer to your performance goal. If you are hurting, you might need a break. Or maybe do something different. You know you will come back stronger tomorrow if you do. 

And if you are drowning, please raise your hand for help. The beautiful thing happening right now is community. We are all in this together.

TO BUY OR NOT TO BUY

PhotoCredit: Emily Baker Studio

Everything feels like a question at the moment. Are masks a good idea? Should I go to the Farmers Market? How much baking is too much baking? Should I cut my own bangs?

Maybe. Probably Not. The Sky Is The Limit. Absolutely Not!

The question I am really pondering is should I be buying #stuff? For my Level 4 lockdown friends the answer is easy, there are no non-essential deliveries. So that Yu Mei handbag you have been mulling has to wait.

In the US, we can still buy handbags. We can still buy a lot of stuff. But should we?

With a possible recession looming. With so many people out of work and hurting. What is the responsible thing to do?

What has become clear to me is that our consumer dollar has a massive amount of power and impact right now. We are literally making decisions about which businesses will still be here in six months. That’s worth thinking about. IMHO.

Personally, I am supporting small businesses who can still ship. A few of my favorites are below and a couple of them have given me amazing discount codes for you to use. So you can direct your #quarantineboredombudget in the right direction. Please let me know if there are others you love and I will curate a bigger list.

RachelGrantJackson: I can’t say enough good things about her oils or her yoga. I would be lost without her wisdom, outlook, breathwork and intelligence. She has kindly offered a 50% off discount for all yoga bundles and oils on her site - good through April 30, 2020. The code for the discount is Squiggly.

Sub_Urban Riot:  You deserve to be uber-comfy. Sub_Urban Riot’s camo striped cambridge sweatpants are my everything. I have two pairs; I needed a backup. I am also obsessed with the Trinity Poppy Tee and the Chelsea Striped Tee. They have offered you a 40% discount using the code community - the code should be embedded in this link: https://www.suburbanriot.com/discount/community

PowellBookStore:  I don’t have a discount code but as you purchase books to get you through this period PLEASE support an independent shop.

Any of the above are necessary items. Spend freely. Otherwise - if your purchase doesn't support small business or your pantry-prepping - maybe you hold off? Save some pennies where you can. Keep a list of what you didn’t buy and look at it again in 30 days. You will find you change your mind on 90% of your list.

Oh, and I will let you know as Yu Mei is shipping again. You can never have enough handbags. 

WHEN IT RAINS

PhotoCredit: Rain

It’s been raining in LA for the last ten days. At least. It’s incessant. Usually, this would be all anyone could talk about. But we don’t talk about the weather...we talk about illness.

The dampness of the rain and the virus and the realities of aloneness are pervasive. They are enough to make you feel sick, even if you are not. There are only so many articles I can read about sore throats before I feel like my throat is sore.

Misery and confusion surround us. It’s tough right now. For some of you it’s brutal. My friend texted me that her daughter just misses her friends. A four year old doesn’t understand her misery. At least we understand ours.

The truth is that it will eventually stop raining in LA. Just as we know we will get through this crisis. We may have some leaks to patch up. Things will look very different. Society will look different. We will look different. 

It’s never been more radiant in LA, despite the rain. Because of the rain. Our air has never been this clean (obviously the reduction in traffic has also helped immensely).

For sure, the sun comes out after the rain. We can be optimistic and know that this too shall pass. We are thankfully not in a nuclear winter (I mean, talk about perspective!). But that’s not my point. 

None of us have the power to stop it raining. We can’t panic the rain away. We can’t toilet-paper purchase the rain away. We can’t plan the rain away. We can lessen its impact, we can put buckets under the leaks, but it’s still going to rain.

There is joyfulness in the moment after being caught in a rain-shower. The moment when you stop resisting the inevitable. You know you will get soaked, your hair will be a disaster, your day inconvenienced. Regardless, you let go and get wet. That’s our work right now. As painful and disappointing and depressing and frustrating and lonely and frightening as this whole mess is. 

Just be in it. See it for what it is. Stop resisting it. Look for the opportunity. Look for the unexpected. I promise you that even in the darkest moments of our lives there is magic lurking. 

BE KIND

PhotoCredit: ClipArtLibrary.com

It's a curious kind of crazy in the world right now. All the superlatives are being used to describe it. My favorite superlative is extraordinary. This is what we must be amidst the chaos. 

Extraordinarily Brave. Extraordinarily Kind. Extraordinarily Safe.

How you show up in these times will dictate your future. Busy, reactive and fearful will not win this race. Your power move in the coming weeks is precision.

My advice:
1. Sleep. It's hard to rest but sleep is the number one way to build your immunity. Do not compromise.
2. Laugh. Golden Retriever Puppies on google image search always does it for me. Laughter is the best way to do an instant full body reboot.
3. Breath. If you feel the panic coming on just focus your mind on your breath. Breathe in and out through your nose. Slow your inhale and slow your exhale even more. 
4. Tea. When you don't know what else to do, go and make a cup of tea. Hot beverages also send a message to your brain that everything is going to be alright.

We are squigglers. We know what to do. We've got this!

PLAN TO FAIL

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My goal this year is to make 53 sustained life changes. One change a week. I get to overachieve because it’s a leap year with an extra week as a consequence.

Well that was the theory in January. Once February started I felt like one of those wind-up toys that had de-wound itself. The pep was missing from my step.

The first thing we tend to do when we are under-performing is look for someone or something to blame. Often this is ourselves. Conveniently the astrological phenomenon “Mercury in retrograde” has been in effect over the past month. So clearly that’s what I can point to as the problem. It’s not me, it’s the alignment of the planets!

Mercury in retrograde is commonly seen as a great time to reflect, review and plan. As a rebel who is oriented to change, planning and reflection do not come naturally to me. Change is fun and exciting. Discipline is for boring losers.

But over the years I have come to learn that planning, somewhat counter-intuitively, helps me squiggle. Planning is deeply supportive of my rebellion. 

I have almost (almost) become disciplined about planning. Each Sunday I review my to do list and determine my Steven Covey big rocks for the coming week. I also set specific goals to work on. This is where I have been adding in my 53 changes. Things like read a book a week, do a daily yoga home-practice, meditate for 20 minutes, do two hours of bookkeeping a week. The bookkeeping one is kicking my butt - especially as I don’t eat sugar anymore. The one way I could guarantee I would get a hated task done was to bribe myself with candy.

As I establish my focus for the week, I also review the prior week. How did I track to my ambition? Did I achieve my priority tasks or did they get lost in the whirlwind of the week?  Reviewing and reflecting on the prior week helps me see how to navigate toward my intended outcome. 

Here is a Squiggly-Tube on how I do my weekly planning. The video is under five minutes and be sure to watch the outtakes at the end. Rugby has a small cameo and I reveal my stationery obsession.

In trying to understand my #FebruaryFail it’s been very helpful to review my weekly planning for clues. In February I had a lot of travel. That always throws me off. As a consequence I wasn't disciplined with my planning which starts to have a flow-on effect. And then the obvious issue, I am trying to do too much.

When we struggle it’s easy to be super self-critical. Our revision process becomes much more of the “oh my god I’m useless” variety. “FML”, “why do I even bother?”...”might as well give up now”. 

Finding strength in the weak moments is game-changing. Every moment that we manage to pull ourselves from the quick-sand of defeat we build resilience. Resilience layers and builds like a muscle, so from each moment of struggle we make ourselves stronger. 

Squiggling necessitates that we get things wrong from time to time. The magic lies in curious reflection. Being curious about what is working and what isn’t. Not leaping to judgment or blame. We have to allow a little space for imperfection. Or Mercury in retrograde. Plan to fail. 

ROCK, PAPER, SCISSORS

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I had one of those mornings last week. You know the ones. Where you wake up and realize you can’t be bothered. Like AT ALL. 

There are more things to do that you have either the energy or motivation for. 

Bottom line, you can’t be arsed. Forget Webster. Urban Dictionary defines "can’t be arsed" as seriously demotivated; disinclined to get off one’s arse; or unwilling to do something.

How about all of the above?

So what do you do when confronted by your inner three-year old? How do you move through an energy block?

I like the advice offered by this Quartz article; “When you don’t know what to do, make tea.” Making a pot of tea always helps me, a nice bit of proactive procrastination. I also put on a playlist. A little Spotify action always helps.

And then, I am ashamed to admit this, I turn to my less important tasks. This runs counter to everything I believe. I know I am supposed to do my high priority tasks first. Get my Steve Covey big rocks crossed off my list. Starting with what Covey would call the sand is the opposite of productive. It’s distractive.

But sometimes we need a distraction. Our wiring gets a bit funky and we need to reset ourselves. The big tasks, the rocks, require too much processing power; more processing power than we have.

So I turn to the sand. The lesser tasks. Doing a few of these generates momentum, gets my brain going. Tea, Spotify, organizing my photos, cleaning up Evernote, ordering some new pens. I always need new pens. Clean up my desktop files, make a hair appointment, take out the recycling, order more coffee beans.

I have been known to gamify it by setting myself 30 minutes to see how much email I can reply to. Setting time targets helps generate a little adrenaline and, consequently, a little energy.

It’s important to know when to follow the rules and when to break them. Anything goes as long as you are intentional about why you are doing it. Plus, my inner three-year old gets really bored if I follow the rules all the time.

Check out my video explaining Steven Covey’s Big Rocks here: Squiggly-Tube. I know, I’m getting all vloggy on you now. Let me know what you think and, now you know the rules, let your inner three-year old play!

EXPECTING DIFFERENT RESULTS

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I have a very strong “grrrrr” reflex. It automatically fires in many situations and results in knee-jerk and combative responses. Who me? I know, I seem so lovely. 

It’s completely ineffective as it creates a mostly defensive reaction from the other person. Oh, and did I mention the fact that most of the time it’s quite clear the pissing me off thing was not intentional?

So recently, instead of my usual over-reaction, I tried something new. I asked myself “how else could I deal with this?” 

I am not about to tell you it worked like a charm. I deal in reality. Reality dictates iteration over certainty. Slowly working your way to a place of transformation versus “you shall go to the ball” insta-results. Results of the ‘it will not happen overnight, but it will happen’ variety. 

“The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” Evidently it was not Einstein that said this, though it sounds like something he would have surmised. A scientist knows better than to repeat a test under the same conditions and expect an altered outcome. 

It is an insanity to repeat a behavior in the expectation of a different result. So why is it so damn hard to break the circuit?

Simply put, it takes effort to undo any neural patterning. Our brain is wired for efficiency and it will take the shortest route. Always. We are designed to react. We need to learn to respond. 

The wisdom of responding (preferably thoughtfully and in full observation of the ‘count to ten’ rule) is undeniable. We need to create space. To pause. The pause enables us to respond rather than react. Reacting - as I have said before - is what you do when you encounter lions and tigers and bears. Oh my! Evolved humans respond. Except for when facing said tigers, bears and lions.

The face-palm of it all is that our busy-ness is actually making us busier. Without the space to try a different solution to a problem we find ourselves caught in a cycle of pattern repetition.  Patterns that are destined for failure. How is THAT for a definition of insanity? It’s like the Russian Dolls of productivity. Our busy-ness makes us repeat unproductive patterns that result in making us even busier.

The icing on the neurological cake is the concept of synaptic pruning. It’s such a cool term which essentially suggests that the less you use the old pathways (AKA the non-effective behaviors) the more likely the brain is to eliminate these pathways entirely. Well, according to this one article I read online but it makes complete sense. The brain can be brilliant, if you let it.

Making the time - and finding the energy - to create new patterns and behaviors not only increases the chances of hopefully better results but it also helps us remove the repeated patterns that are not benefiting us. 

It’s not magic. But it could be. Bibbidi-Bobbidi-Boo!

FREE YOUR MIND

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My niece asked me to braid her hair this morning. I had been staying with my family for a few days between board meetings. I guess this was a great sign, she trusted me enough to style her for school.

Braids? No big deal. Except, the request was for Dutch Braids. Crap. YouTube to the rescue.

I had confidence in myself (just) but I wasn't confident she would sit still as I attempted #thelook? I was pleasantly surprised. She was. VERY.

This little being that couldn’t follow a single instruction all weekend miraculously became an angel.

Nothing puts your workload into perspective like a weekend with a six-year old and a three-year old. Multi-million dollar negotiations are nothing in the face of determining toy ownership or adjudicating who built their lego faster.

My inner three-year old is much like my nephew. Highly distractible. We get up to all sorts of unproductive mischief together. I had so much silly-fun with him over the weekend.

My niece and my inner six-year old share a lot in common too. More serious. Highly aspirational, never satisfied and always searching for something bigger and better. My inner six-year old is a critic; extraordinarily discerning and relentless.

I could see the reflection of my inner six-year old in my niece as I tried to teach her to meditate the day prior. She fidgeted, suggested better uses of our time, and couldn't focus. Today, she sat like a pro. She had a bigger prize. "Dutch Braids" was her 'little m' mantra.

We all have that inner three-year old and inner six-year old. My inner three-year old will not meditate. We will do one breath but then we are off looking for dirt piles to dig in or cupboards to empty. Like most of us, my inner six-year old will meditate but she needs to know what is in it for her. We need to be clear about the bigger prize.

Our other excuses for why we don't meditate are garbage. Or resistance if you need me to be nicer about it.

The bottom line is that it’s hard for all of us to sit still. We lose sight of the bigger prize. Our inner-six year old wins out, distracting us with a catalogue of complaints. A catalogue of other things we could be doing. The critic takes hold of our mind and our solitude becomes an endless parade of ideas. 

Fighting six-year olds and fighting busy-ness are the wrong responses to the inherent problem. The goal is not total zen. The goal is for a micro-moments of calm in a busy mind. Sips of peace when drinking from the fire-hose of chaos.

Meditation is like Dutch Braids for your brain: functional, instagrammable and transformative. It's just that one will transform your look and the other your life. Not a bad prize in the scheme of things.

STARTING OUT

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A brand-new notebook is equal parts intimidating and exciting. The palpable power of the waiting pages to transform your life. A place for your brain to come out and play. Each page is a possibility. 

There are lots of theories on how to notebook. Simple journaling can be cathartic: longform thoughts and musings on life. Like your ideas might be important one day. Something Winston Churchill probably did. Something Anne Frank definitely did, luckily for us. 

Daily manifesting is powerful. A long-term practise of handwriting your vision for the future has real impact. Not because of fairies and unicorns (though let’s not completely dismiss that possibility) but because your brain starts to calibrate to a new reality. The reality you are scripting for yourself.

Bullet-journaling is a wonderfully creative way to focus your mind. It’s also potentially a great way to waste time as it gets complex, fast. Gratitude lists are a powerful way to create positivity in your life. The morning pages system is simple and great for when your brain is stuck. 

My attempts at all these systems inevitably regresses back to my to-do lists, weekly planning and notes on books. My notebooks are utilitarian. They are serious. I instruct #thestepson to draw in them to make me feel like I am cool. Borrowing his cool. I tell him to pick random pages and not show me - so it’s a surprise when I come across his sketches. I think it amuses him that I might turn a page in a board meeting and be greeted by a giraffe smoking a cigarette.

The only bad use of a notebook is no notebook. Every time you reach for yours something magical could happen. What new reality could be born? 

When we leave ideas in our head we diminish their potential. We give power to our thoughts when we put ink to paper. We give our ideas momentum through the action of writing. We take the first step in a series of actions that can take us forward. What we want to accomplish, who we want to become and how we want to walk the earth. 

The written word on a page is a declaration. So declare it. Open up a new page and state your intention. However you are moved to. Write a list or a quote. Draw a picture or fill a page. It doesn’t matter how. It just matters that you do it. 

SHORT & SWEET

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I came across this article from The Atlantic on how to email. The author, James Hamblin, sums up email 'etiquette' perfectly stating, “An email is an imposition on a person’s time.”

Austin Kleon takes this further, assessing whether you are likely crazy based on the length of your email. Kleon is fantastic, if you don't know his work you should check him out.

Email is freeform. It allows you to rave on as if your audience has nothing better to do. Email is not a text message. Or a tweet for that matter. And maybe that's part of the problem. Texts are inherently short and to the point. And most emails would be infinitely improved with a limitation of 140 characters.

Making this worse are the emails that bury the lead. It’s annoying enough in a news article. There should be no doubt from the first sentence what you wish your audience to action or consider.

I can feel you nodding as I write this.

The sad thing is that Hamblin's article is circa-2016. We should know better by now. We don’t need five images at the bottom of our email signature. We don’t need an email signature. Mine is my name and my cellphone number. Edit what you write, get four paragraphs down to four lines. Get four lines down to 4 words (I double dog dare you).

We have abused email for long enough. Be the change you want to see in the world.