Tag Archives: mood management

Correction Without Resentment

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2015-04-01 16.55.13

A coach is someone who can give correction without causing resentment.

— John Wooden

Coach Wooden hits the nail on the head. Looking deeper, I ask myself, as the corrector, “What am I seeking to achieve here?”

Constant correction, mostly non-verbalized, floats through my head.

Criticism, dissatisfaction, endless tweaking and optimization… what purpose does it serve?

What is the source of this correction?

  • Is it habit?
  • Is it altruism?
  • Is it a desire to alleviate the pain I see from watching you suffer?

Too often, my correction-by-habit makes my family suffer.

Sit quietly in a room full of children. Notice two things…

  • How little the master teachers correct.
  • How much the novice parents correct.

The frazzled parents beg for the children to listen.

When I catch myself, I slow down to see if the situation will resolve itself.

It’s humbling to realize how much of the distraction I create by hurrying.

How do the masters get through to us…

  • Fix myself first
  • Shared laughter
  • Wait until asked
  • Keep it short

When I am tempted to carpet bomb my Facebook feed, I remind myself that the world is filled with good people, particularly in the homes of my enemies. What might those good people need from me?

Share a laugh, keep it short and remember…

…the important stuff happens under my own roof.

Too Kind Too Generous

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ax_and_bellaHow do you deal with someone telling you that you’re too kind or too generous?

What if the person telling you is your inner voice?!

I wasn’t sure how to handle, so I went for a bike ride to consider my alternatives.

Riding along, I laughed when I realized that people never tell me that I’m too kind to them, only too kind to others.

A little later, I laughed again when I realized that I seem to have everyone fooled. My too-kind-too-generous strategy is solely in my self interest.

So, rather than get grumpy. A better reaction is to share that…

You are a good person.

Remember that my capacity to help another person isn’t limited to them. It’s how I treat you.

+++

I looked a little deeper and considered the times where I felt that life was giving someone else too much of a good thing.

These feelings are related to the difficulty that I can have with other people’s success and happiness.

I realized my criticism was flowing from a fear that there wasn’t enough for me.

+++

I’ll end with a song that my son learned when he was two-years old.

The song is called Magic Penny and this is my favorite part…

Love is something if you give it away,
Give it away, give it away.
Love is something if you give it away,
You end up having more.

It’s just like a magic penny,
Hold it tight and you won’t have any. 
Lend it, spend it, and you’ll have so many
They’ll roll all over the floor.

My children are excellent teachers.

My Five Best Friends

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mountain_axIf you ask me what being a father is like then I might share that it is often horrible.

However, if you ask me to describe my life then I would assure you that it is wonderful.

I might follow this realization by making an attribution error of…

  1. horrible = kids
  2. wonderful = myself

I don’t think that I’m the only one making this mistake.

What’s actually happening inside my head when I’m feeling “horrible?”

Horrible doesn’t happen until I’m stretched and decide to label my fatigue.

If I am rested then parenting is fatiguing. I become tired by the effort required to improve myself.

Perhaps, I am creating habits that make the not-horrible aspects of my life wonderful?

I’m not sure, we all love a good story and I might be fooling myself.

For the last five years, I have been working on:

  • De-escalation
  • Yield Whenever Possible
  • Not-response
  • Redirection
  • Say What You Want To Have Happen

Other than the last point, parenting hasn’t come naturally to me. Taking stock, I ask myself…

  • Which emotional states did I reinforce today?
  • How do the people that are close to me make me feel?
  • Who is creating these feelings?

Change and Couples

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balloon_hatI was riding with a buddy and he shared…

I’ve been the same guy since she married me. I don’t understand why she keeps expecting me to change.

I had no idea about my pal’s marriage so I shared my opinion of our relationship…

Well, you’re a good guy and I’m grateful for everything that you’ve taught me.

Later, I realized that I’ve been on both sides of the conversation many times.

The thoughts, of the husband AND the wife, happen so often they are a habit of mine.

My habit isn’t useful.

Here’s what I’ve learned about personal change.

When I’m resisting a person that knows me well, it is because there is a conflict between (a) the truth of what they are saying; and (b) what I think will make me happy.

An example from my past was a belief that a life of constant exercise and extreme nutrition would make me happy. This was true, until it wasn’t. When it wasn’t true any more, somebody pointing out that my family might benefit from an engaged father, more than a top athlete, could have triggered resistance in me.

An even more simple example would be if my wife pointed out that eating Pad Thai and drinking beer, didn’t appear to make me happier than eating salad and drinking tea!

In the above two examples, I figured things out for myself but there must be other areas where I continue to fool myself.

I pay attention because there is no trigger without truth.

++

Now, the other side of the conversation.

Placing my personal happiness in another person’s capacity to change is foolish.

First, because what I think changes from moment-to-moment!

Second, because when I pay attention to what causes true happiness within me… it has nothing to do with “you changing”, and everything to do with my own choices.

Easy to say, tough to realize.

The way I figured out the above, was to make my desires real by playing “I’ll be happy when…”

  • Write down everything that will make me happy (once and for all) 🙂
  • Compare my happy-list to what’s happening when I’m really happy
  • Realize that I am constantly fooling myself

Teach my folly.

 

An Illusion of Individual Experience

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riverMy buddy, AC, wrote a good article about his athletic journey.

Alan’s article was a reminder of my own capacity for self-harm and a need to remain vigilant against fooling myself. You see, my story is the same with different details.

I make a cameo in the last decade of Alan’s life and my friends have been talking to me about their own experience.

I wanted to share part of a conversation…

A – I could never do that.
G – Never do what?

A – I could never share my story.
G – You might want to be careful with that.

A – Careful with what?
G – Be careful about making affirmations to conceal your truth

When you start to share your truth, you’re likely to discover that it’s really our truth.

Be brave.

Educating A Beautiful Girl

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Lexi in MoabAn enduring benefit from working across cultures, races, sexual orientation, body mass indices and beauty is an increased capacity to see myself in other people.

If you look closely then you’ll see that power-seekers have a tendency to focus on the wickedness of “them.” It’s an effective argument employed by the media, politicians and our leaders.

Pointing out “their wickedness” is so common that I search for teachers that are careful to avoid an appeal to wickedness.

A story…

My daughter and I were heading into the supermarket in Moab. People in the desert look different than people in Boulder.

Dad, dad… that homeless guy is stealing all the food.

Sweetie, look carefully, he’s taking his groceries to his car.

With her filters off, my daughter reminded me that I have some work to do.

Another example…

The wealth effect of excessive living is obvious. However, if you look deeply then you’ll discover another, far more subtle, effect. You’ll be able to feel a separation between yourself and other people.

As you separate yourself, you will be prone to seeing “their wickedness.”

The physical separation is in plain sight – education policy, gated communities, exclusive clubs, athletic ability…

In Boulder, we don’t need gates, the price of real estate makes an effective barrier to entry, especially when combined with private school fees (so our children are protected from their children).

If you sit quietly then you will feel a deeper separation. It makes us miserable and allows us to be manipulated.

An antidote…

  • Humility in my own needs
  • Spending time outside my “tribe”
  • Looking inwards at my tendency to hold myself separate

Later in the trip I asked my daughter…

Who gets hurt when you’re scared or angry?

PJs

Handling Criticism with Grace

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2015-03-14 11.37.55

I was dropping my kids at school and overheard a conversation between a parent and teacher.

The parent was running through a shopping list of needs for her little one and explaining how the teachers had been falling short.

As I listened to the parent, I could feel myself digging in on behalf of the school and the teachers.

…don’t you know how long we’ve been doing this

…do you really thing you know better

…does any of this truly matter

Instead, the teacher listened carefully and let the parent talk herself out completely.

She replied,

Those are good ideas and I want to thank you for your patience with us.

Absolute brilliance!

The reply took the energy out of the situation and the parent was grateful that she was heard.

I took the “thank you for your patience” and have been working with it.

I use it with myself – stay calm be patient.

I use it with my family – I am working to improve, thank you for your patience

And, I use it when people offer correction – those are good ideas and I want to thank you for your patience.

 

Managing My Endurance Passion

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G-BoraRecent media reports have linked “extreme” exercise to shortened lifespan (versus moderate exercisers). There is not an agreed definition of what constitutes extreme but, even at my current noncompetitive level of activity, I qualify.

My endurance pals have responded like Charlton Heston at an NRA rally.

If you want me to change then you can pry my fitbit from my cold, dead hands…

Ultradistance athletes are the true believers of endurance sport (links to classic book).

Many of us have replaced a previous passion, sometimes a negative addiction, with endurance sport.

Some of us are managing our “bad habits” via exercise.

All of us are terrified about the implications of change. Listen to our thoughts about anyone with a normal BMI.

Having watched friends revert to previous lifestyles, and having no desire to make a return myself (!), I thought I’d offer some practical ideas for managing our passion.

As always, I start by asking myself questions:

  • Where can things go wrong?
  • Is a multi-decade strategy to continually rip the legs of my aging competition wise?
  • What’s the minimum change required for maximum harm reduction?

Hands down, the worst thing that can happen to any aging athlete is losing the ability to train. Physically, strength losses are slow to return. Mentally, we are prone to depression via inactivity.

I’d be willing to compromise quite a bit to protect my ability to keep on trucking!

You are not going to get a lot of lifestyle modification by telling me that “strenuous” exercise isn’t good for me.

Not going to happen!

You see, I know how I was living without exercise in my life.

You might get me to change a little by pointing out the risk of:

  1. Dying via bike crash
  2. Orthopedic damage
  3. Concussion risk
  4. General malaise from soreness and fatigue

In fact, you didn’t have to bring it up. I see it all around me and have modified my lifestyle to take the above into account.

  • Highway riding avoidance
  • Adding front/rear lights for improved visibility
  • Rarely train in a group
  • No more bike racing
  • Main bike is full-suspension mountain bike

These small changes have improved my risk profile but I have ignored them when training for an event that required them, and when spending time with friends that could care less.

So, like any behavioral modification, my changes are only as sticky as my ability to choose wisely with peers and events.

I’ve written about low standard deviation training HERE and HERE.

Here’s what I’ve been doing:

  • Aim to train every AM and PM
  • Workout defined as leaving my house
  • Focus on frequency (AM/PM), not duration, not load
  • Wide variation in effort, from walking to max
  • Lots of hills
  • Don’t measure (other than a weekly weight check)

I end up with 11-14 doses per week and remain inside the “extreme” segment of recent physiological studies.

I’d estimate my current plan at 30% less hours, 60% less load and 90% less fatigue/soreness.

I exercise a lot, but less than I used to. I suspect the taper will continue as I age.

The small changes have improved my risk profile and increased the non-competitive benefits I receive from exercise (mood, motivation, creativity, sex drive).

++

I don’t expect you to change…

…but this is an alternative that reduces the chance you might have to shut down your endurance passion

…or end up replacing it with a prior negative addiction!

In times of injury, stress, divorce, despair… I hope you will remember this article.

Exercise has been a very good friend to my family.

The Fountain of Youth

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2015-02-10 16.55.59When I was a student at McGill University, I took a course about insurance. Our teacher worked in the life insurance industry. He had us fill out a lifestyle risk assessment.

I was surprised that my risk was off-the-charts.

Of course it was.

It’s adaptive for young men to be clueless.

As I tell my wife…

Men under 30 lack the capacity to access risk 

Some of us grow out of it.

Some don’t.

To make it easy for the guys, the teacher gave us three things:

  1. Don’t speed
  2. Wear a seat belt
  3. Don’t smoke

All three became life-long habits.

What’s that have to do with aging?

My professor was recommending that we eliminate choices that kill students early. He was speaking to lifespan (don’t smoke), and what kills teenage men (speed and seat belts). He knew that telling us to drink less would have been futile.

I have been reading about healthspan (links to Washington Post article).

Healthspan means optimizing my choices for independent living and being able to share experiences with the people I love.

If you’re smoking and/or speeding without a seatbelt, then focus on those first.

How do we extend, and protect, our healthspan?

Treat being mortal like heart disease

Via diet, stress and exercise

My recipe

  1. Identify and jettison stress
  2. Move my body in nature
  3. Eat real food
  4. Sleep enough that I often wake up before my alarm

Keep it simple.

The Body You Want

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When my wife was a teenager, she really wanted curves.

coach_monsyThings worked out.

My teenage desires were different, but common. I wanted to be jacked.

gordo_crunchThat worked out too.

By the time we both got exactly what we wanted, we wanted something else.

We wanted to be whippet skinny so we could run fast.

We wanted to look like tall, but ripped, 14-year-olds!

G_WhipThat worked out, again.

I spent twenty-five years only to get right back where I started.

I noticed that there is an enduring feeling of my body being slightly unsatisfactory.

Once I noticed this pattern with my body, I saw it elsewhere.

Personal safety, other people’s driving, my house, my finances, my life situation… In many situations, there is a slight feeling of unsatisfactory.

I’m always striving to attain satisfaction that’s is just-out-of-reach.

As a young man, I might have seen striving as a good thing. My drive for improvement, my competitive urges, a desire for self-improvement… we have lots of names for the feeling.

Some cultures call it misery.

See what it feels like for you.

++

When I work with others, we use a simple technique.

  • Write down what will make you satisfied.
  • Write down what will make you less afraid.
  • Write down what will make you feel secure.

Out of your list, choose one thing and work towards it.

Work slowly, pay attention, write things down.

Give yourself at least 1,000 days.

Ten years might be better.

You might get there quicker.

With my body, I didn’t start to notice my pattern until I’d been at it for twenty-five years!

With finances, I was lucky, I saw my pattern after a decade, took a leave of absence and enjoyed my first retirement.

++

The fact that the lesson took a long time was helpful.

Good things happen slowly.

It’s tempting to short cut the process via cosmetic surgery, performance enhancing drugs, or cutting corners (fraud, tax evasion, deception).

Short-cuts rarely work because we fail to notice the slightly unsatisfactory feeling is following us everywhere,

My victories didn’t work, either. My successes left me wanting more and the feeling followed me around.

++

So I tried enjoying myself…

Pleasure can temporarily mask the unsatisfactory feeling and many use drugs, alcohol, fatigue and other techniques.

The trouble is… the associated hangovers are increasingly unsatisfactory as I age.

What to do?

If you can see the unsatisfactory nature of things then you might ask “who’s not satisfied?”

Once I could see the “unsatisfied person” it was easier for me to decide he wasn’t going to run the show.

At least, some of the time.

😉