DaveWitwicki.com

“Can’t see the forest for the trees” is an old adage that unfortunately is all too true for many people these days. It’s generally used to describe someone who’s focused on the small details to the detriment of a larger plan.

Lately, I’ve been finding myself focusing on the details a little too much and it’s causing me to lose sight of the big picture. This actually came to me while I was doing dishes. How ironic since I find there’s nothing more mundane and “small focus” than daily chores. Of course, these things need to be done but the key is not to get lost in them.

Levels of Focus

I see there being four broad levels of focus in life:

1. Daily “maintenance” tasks : most obviously, these are things like dishes, laundry and cooking. But I also include less obvious things such as the daily commute and status meetings at work.
2. Goals : these are the immediate actions you need to take to improve your life such as daily exercise, meditation, self-development reading and recreation (yes, I’m saying recreation is a worthwhile goal).
3. Dreams : these are the bigger picture things that you derive your goals from. Time-wise, they may be near term (90 days) or longer distance (5 years) but overall, they represent a milestone that makes your life better. This level includes such things as being healthy, having financial freedom and doing something difficult like rock climbing the Eternal Flame route up the Nameless Tower.
4. Life Purpose : this is what you long for and strive towards. It gives meaning to your existence.

Each level supports the level above while, ideally, deriving context from that level. So, your daily tasks are done to allow you to work on your goals which give progress towards your dreams which ultimately fulfill your life purpose. There’s much to be said on the details of each level but I’ll save that for future posts. Today I want deal with techniques for keeping yourself mindful of the higher levels of focus while dealing with the lower levels.

Techniques

I use a variety of techniques to keep things in perspective. All of them require time and that seems to be the thing in short supply when you lose sight of the higher levels. I really have to wonder if lack of time is a cause or effect of this short-sightedness. Anyway, here’s some of the things I do:

• Morning Meditation : I like to spend at least a half hour in the morning working on my mental state. I use a variety of different activities here including Mind Movies, meditating, reading, stating affirmations and quiet contemplation. Whatever activities you choose to use, the key is to mentally see and emotionally feel the power of living your life purpose. Then, let these images and feelings trickle down and infuse your dreams with energy.
• Bedtime Journaling : I end my day off by writing in my journal about how my day went, successes I experienced, written affirmations and anything interesting that happened. I generally exclude anything negative as that’s not something I want to pay attention to right before sleeping. This helps put perspective on my day and remind me of the bigger picture.
• Midday Timeouts : These are just quick 5 minute periods where I extract myself from daily living and enjoy some quiet contemplation. On the weekends, I’ll go find an empty room or step outside and listen to an uplifting song. During the week I’ll go for a quick walk around my office building or go hide in a bathroom stall (kind of strange, I know, but it works). This keeps me from drowning in the deluge of daily “stuff” that flows my way and allows me to remember that there’s a higher purpose to my actions.
• Mobile Motivation : Whenever I’m engaged in solo level one tasks, I put on my headphones and listen to either great tunes or motivational audiobooks. If I’m mentally alert and/or doing a task that doesn’t take much of my attention I’ll choose audiobooks otherwise I’ll use good music. This helps keep me from being negative about the activity I’m doing and puts me in a better state of mind.

Overall, I find the morning and bedtime activities are important and I strive to do them regularly while the timeouts and mobile listening are good maintenance techniques. I find it interesting that I’ve been staying up late this past week which has led to me sleeping later (never scrimp on sleep, that’s bad) which has led to my morning routine being shortened and I’ve really noticed the difference. It’s been hard to keep perspective on my dreams.

Give some of these techniques a try and let me know how it works out for you. Or, if you have some techniques of your own that you’d like to share, I’d love to hear about them. Stay focused my friend.

- Dave

I’ve decided to check out twitter. Twitter seems to be one of those things that either you get it or you don’t. Honestly, I don’t get it. However, I think I should. In hopes of understanding, I installed UberTwitter on my Blackberry and I’ll try tweeting once in a while to see what happens. If you’re interested in following me, my twitter name is DaveWitwicki (I know, how imaginative). I plan to integrate twitter into the blog at some point but I’m considering a theme change so I’ll hold off for now.

I’ve also added the sociable plugin to the blog. It’s the “Share and Enjoy” thing at the bottom of the posts. I see it everywhere and figure it might encourage people to share my content. Is that a good thing? I don’t know but I’m willing to try it out and see what happens…

- Dave

I’ve been doing a lot of personal development work lately in some of the key areas of my life such as health/fitness, family/friend relationships and work/career. I’ve set ambitious goals for the work/career area but have found that pursuing those goals could potentially risk the well-being of my family. This has created a conflict between my familial responsibilities and my personal needs.

When attempting to resolve conflicts like this you need to consider what areas of your life are impacted and what the priority of those areas are. Personally, I put myself first, then my family, then work, and then everything else. If you think that sounds selfish, consider the classic example of the instructions the airline gives when discussing the oxygen masks. You need to put your own mask on first before helping others with their masks because you can’t help anyone if you can’t breath. Similar concept here when it comes to taking care of needs. If your own needs are not met, how can you possibly meet the needs of others?

Here’s where it gets interesting. Based on the above reasoning, you could say that it’s more important that you take care of yourself by transitioning into a fulfilling career even if it means risking the well-being of your family. After all, didn’t I just say that you should put yourself first? And doesn’t that imply that your well-being takes priority over your family’s well-being? Well, you could use that reasoning and I suspect many success-driven folks do indeed follow that line of thinking. For example, while watching the premiere episode of Shark Tank the other day, one of the entrepreneurs admitted that he’d mortgaged his home twice, spent his retirement money and kids’ college funds and had nothing left to invest; in essence, he put his well-being ahead of his family’s. One of the “sharks” responded with the admonishment that you need to take care of your family first regardless of your business aspirations.

So, the question becomes how do you balance responsibilities against needs? We’ve established that a typical chain of responsibility should be Self > Family > Work > Everything Else (if God is a part of your life then the chain is God > Self > Family > Work > Church > Everything Else). When considering needs, I find Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs to be a good model to work from. Basically, needs at the bottom of the hierarchy should be fulfilled before working on the next level up. The needs from bottom to top are Physiological > Safety > Social > Esteem > Self-Actualization.

Mapping responsibilities against needs results in a fairly straighforward method of determining which is more important. For each need in Maslow’s hierarchy, you should cover off each area of responsibility before moving up the hierarchy to the next need. So, in the case of pursuing a more fulfilling job vs the well-being of your family it becomes clear that your family comes first since Safety in all areas is more important than your personal Social/Esteem needs.

I am certain there are numerous criticisms possible of both Maslow’s hierarchy and the chain of responsibility outlined but I believe it’s important to have some sort of relatively objective framework. There are also gray areas in this model. A big one that comes to mind for me is friends. Where do they fit in? Life is messy and objectively compartmentalizing all aspects of your life may be difficult and/or inappropriate. Ultimately, you need to consider your choices and do what you feel  is best. Models like this merely provide some food for thought.

- Dave

I watched Yes Man with Jim Carrey last night. I really enjoyed the movie and recommend it. It did get me thinking though. Besides the obvious personal growth theme of the movie which I think is awesome. There were a couple other things that stood out for me.

Say Yes

First, let’s consider the main theme: saying yes to life’s opportunities. I think we can all use a reminder of this. It’s very easy to get caught up in the daily routine and shy away from anything that deviates from said routine. If you know anything about personal growth, you know that’s a bad thing. Change is good, it’s important, and it’s absolutely necessary for growth. Enough said.

You Can’t Audit Life

At one point early on, Carl (the main character) finds himself at a personal development seminar. Although the movie pokes fun at PD seminars in general, there was one line that really stood out for me. Carl, in trying to avoid attention claims that he’s “just auditing the course” to which the guru responds “You can’t audit life”. That is so true! There is no practice run, there is no do over, there is no “I’ll get it right next time” option. You are living your real life each and every day and you need to participate in that life.

Use Your Head

[Spoiler Warning]
Later on in the movie when the inevitable problems occur, Carl confronts the guru who tells him that he shouldn’t take the whole thing too seriously.
[/Spoiler Warning]

As with all growth opportunities in life, you need to use your head and consider how best to make any piece of advice work for you. It’s easy to get caught up in following someone else’s system. Everyone has good advice on what worked for them and it’s oh so tempting to do what they did with the hope that you’ll get the same results they did. Plain and simple, it doesn’t work that way. No matter how hard someone tries to capture the essence of their process, they will miss some of the bits that made the process work for them. We’re all unique individuals and no one system will work for everyone (or even anyone else).

Now I’m not saying that you shouldn’t try someone else’s system. But do it wisely. Try it out, then take the pieces that work for you and incorporate them into your life. For the parts that don’t seem to get you results, leave them be. Keep in mind that you may need to try something for awhile before you can be sure it doesn’t work for you. Personal growth is uncomfortable and you will struggle with change. Just try to be aware of the difference between persevering for the sake of growth and wasting your time on useless action.

Bottom Line

Growth is hard. It’s so much easier to sit around and watch TV instead of working towards your dreams (you have dreams, don’t you?) but the only thing sitting around leads to is more sitting around. To live the life of your dreams, you need to say yes to the opportunities life presents and then you need to take action. What action are you taking today?

- Dave

I have hundreds of these index card sized bookmarks that my dad had printed years ago. They’re blue and have a poem he wrote in 1972. On the back they have a little song that he used to motivate his sales team at the time. I’ll leave the song alone since I rarely look at it myself, but here is the poem:

End Of The Day

My daily work has come to pass,
And tell me, Lord, if I may ask -
Today has now come to an end,
Did I take from it all I can?

This day no longer will come to me,
It’s gone, it’s passed, no more to be -
For what I missed and did not do,
With all that time I wasted too.

I promise that this is the end,
And starting now, I will begin
To start each day off with a plan,
And carry it out to the end.

To make each hour of the day
A followed plan where I can say,
No wasted time has passed me by -
I’m organized, now I will fly!

- Edward Witwicki

Lately I’ve found myself ruminating on past choices I’ve made. It’s easy to get lost in the mental maze of “what if”. What if I’d taken that job, what if I hadn’t said that, what if I’d been more active in X. These lines of thinking can really sap your motivation. Especially since we generally don’t consider the positive choices, only the seemingly negative ones.

As a rule, I try not to regret past choices. I choose to believe that the current state of my life is a result of those choices, both good and bad, and while I may not be totally satisfied with my current state, I’m generally happy with the way things have gone. Keep in mind that if you’re totally satisfied with your current life then you have no reason to change/grow and that leads to stagnation.

So how do you break out of the cycle of mulling over past choices? What can you do to look forward instead of back?

1. First and foremost, you can’t change the past. There is absolutely nothing you can do to make it different. Sure, you can try and make amends but that doesn’t change the original choice.
2. Remember that even if a choice you made turned out totally wrong (from your perspective), at the very least you learned something. You might have to spend some time trying to determine what you learned but it’s there, keep looking.
3. Consider that maybe the choice you made was actually the right choice given the context of the situation. It’s quite possible that you weren’t ready to handle the demands of a given situation and would have found yourself feeling worse than you do now.
4. Check if it’s possible to make that choice again. Some opportunities do come around more than once. Say you turned down a job (or chose not to even apply). Check with the company again. It’s quite possible that the person they did hire is not working out or that they have an even better opportunity now.

It’s important to remember that life is a journey. We can choose to get stuck living in the past, always wondering “what if” or we can choose to live in the now, accepting the choices we have made and looking forward to the magnificent experiences yet to come.

In the long run, we shape our lives, and we shape ourselves. The process never ends until we die. And the choices we make are ultimately our responsibility.
- Eleanor Roosevelt

In the spirit of Father’s day, I have a story for you (with a piece of advice at the end). My father passed away 5 years ago this month after a lengthy illness during which he was bedridden, unable to speak and not entirely coherent most of the time. The illness started with a nasty fall and rapidly went from bad to worse. Even the good days weren’t so good.

Growing up, my dad was not around much. He was self-employed and trying to make his “fortune” in one failed venture after another. He typically worked 12-16 hour days interspersed with weeks on the road where he wasn’t home at all. When he was around, he was busy doing upkeep on the house or working on his latest business. As such, he didn’t spend much time with me and by the age of 11, I figured he wouldn’t notice/care if I wasn’t around so I ran away from home. I was gone for three days before the clerk at the local 7-11 ratted me out and my dad came and brought me back home. Thankfully, that was the wakeup call he needed and our entire relationship changed. After that we spent more time together and the rest of my teen years produced many fond memories of late night card games and “talks” about everything a teenage boy could possibly want to know.

In my grade 12 year, my dad became rather ill and nearly died. Luckily, his sister came and practically dragged him to the hospital so he survived (minus some body parts and with a lifetime “condition”). Once again, he had an awakening and now our conversations became more serious. We learned to talk openly and honestly to each other although we now found ourselves drifting apart somewhat as I attempted to make my way in the world.

Over the years, our relationship had it’s ups and downs (as any relationship is bound to) but we stayed pretty close. His health declined slowly and he became more and more dependent on me. Unfortunately, with a young family of my own, his demands conflicted with the demands of my family and caused much stress for both of us. We had some unforgettable blowouts but through it all we managed to hold on to our love for one another and kept the lines of communication open (for the most part).

On the fateful day when he called me at 4am to ask if I could “drop by” before work to pick him up because he’d fallen and been lying on the floor, unable to move, for two days, we were already out of time. There would be no last minute reconciliation. No chance to make amends for past wrongs. No opportunity for him to pass on some final words of wisdom. No tear-jerking heart-to-heart conversation where I’d pour my heart out over all the bad things I said and did and thought while I was growing up. Nothing.

Thankfully, in addition to our unforgettable blowouts, we’d also had that last minute reconciliation. We’d made amends for past wrongs and talked heart-to-heart about anything and everything. He’d passed on the wisdom of his many years and experiences and there was nothing left unsaid. If I had the chance to tell him just one more thing, it would be a simple “I love you” and even that wouldn’t really be necessary.

So, if there’s any sort of ill will between you and your father. If you haven’t spoken to him in a week, a month, a year. If there’s things you’d like to say but just didn’t feel the time was right. Now is the time to do it. If you leave it too long, you may never get the chance. Just pick up the phone and call him. Or write him a letter. Find some way to connect. And while you’re at it, if you haven’t forgiven him yet for all the bad things that happened (and every one of has bad things that happened), now is the time to do that too. Although I don’t personally know what’s it like, I’m certain that missing the chance to make things right must really hurt. Don’t hurt yourself!

- Dave

Many things happen to us everyday. Some things matter and some things don’t. We live in a messy world and by the very nature of interacting with others we will be exposed to a vast range of experiences. I believe that life brings us situations that give us an opportunity to learn. Now some things that happen in our day to day lives are not about us and are really just neutral events. Sure, our reaction to this things can provide a chance to learn something but I think it’s more important to consider the “big things” that happen.

I’m talking about those situations that evoke strong emotions of some sort. Whether it be happiness, sadness, anger or confusion, if you’re feeling something then you’ve likely encountered a “learning point”. Now the important thing to realize is that when these situations occur, you need to look deeper into it and figure out what you can/should learn from this. This is especially true when the situation does not seem to be unfolding as you planned despite your best efforts. In these cases, it’s quite likely that there’s a lesson you need to learn to move forward in your life and, even if you had some magical guide that told you what the lesson is, you’d still need to experience it, live it to really understand.

So, in an effort to help myself grow and learn in these situations, I’ve been trying the following steps:

1. Examine the situation objectively – put your feelings away for a bit and look at a given situation through the eyes of a neutral observer. Try to consider how it looks to those who are not involved.
2. Explore your feelings – take some time to sit quietly and really consider why you feel the way you do. Is it because things are not going as you’d like them to? Do you carry some underlying belief that is preventing you from seeing the truth?
3. Recognize the opportunity – even if things don’t work out as you’d like them to, every situation is an opportunity for growth. In fact, we often grow faster and stronger from those life events that don’t turn out as we’d like.
4. Accept the lesson – unless you plan on isolating yourself from humanity, you’re going to experience learning points. Keep yourself open to these learning points and embrace the growth that occurs.

Change happens whether we like it or not. Refusing to accept and embrace change leads to a life where you go through the motions but never seem to get anywhere. It’s like a hamster running on a wheel. Always going around, never getting anywhere. Step off the wheel, live a little, accept that you’ll fail or get hurt, pick yourself up and carry on.

Sometimes you win and sometimes you learn – Robert Kiyosaki

- Dave

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, and fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small doesn’t serve the world. There’s nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We are born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just in some of us, it’s in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.

These words are most often attributed to Nelson Mandela in his 1994 Inaugural speech. Apparently they are actually by author Marianne Williamson in her book A Return To Love. Regardless of the source, this wonderful message reminds us that we have within us the power to achieve anything. We merely need to let it loose and give ourselves permission to experience the greatness within.

- Dave

I believe in the supreme worth of the individual and in his right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

I believe that every right implies a responsibility; every opportunity, an obligation; every possession, a duty.

I believe that the law was made for man and not man for the law; that government is the servant of the people and not their master.

I believe in the dignity of labor, whether with head or hand; that the world owes no man a living but that it owes every man an opportunity to make a living.

I believe that thrift is essential to well ordered living and that economy is a prime requisite of a sound financial structure, whether in government, business or personal affairs.

I believe that truth and justice are fundamental to an enduring social order.

I believe in the sacredness of a promise, that a man’s word should be as good as his bond; that character – not wealth or power or position – is of supreme worth.

I believe that the rendering of useful service is the common duty of mankind and that only in the purifying fire of sacrifice is the dross of selfishness consumed and the greatness of the human soul set free.

I believe in an all-wise and all-loving God, named by whatever name, and that the individual’s highest fulfillment, greatest happiness, and widest usefulness are to be found in living in harmony with His will.

I believe that love is the greatest thing in the world; that it alone can overcome hate; that right can and will triumph over might.

- John D. Rockefeller, Jr.

[Transcribed from The Secret of the Ages by Robert Collier]