Month: October 2018

Aspiration Inspiration

Every year, around this time, we play a starring role.

We dress up in elaborate costumes, eat way too much candy and decorate our homes as a hotel for the afterlife.

We dim the lights and turn up the creepy music. All in an attempt to spook and scare.

Yes, Halloween traditions are in full swing. And while these festivities are ostensibly for the kids, adults get in the spirit plenty.

This should come as no surprise. After all, children didn’t originate the tradition of dressing as a pumpkin, or a lion, or a Storm Trooper on the last day of October every year. The first time many kids wore a costume, they were too young to even understand what they were dressed up as.

And going door to door, asking for candy from strangers? If kids came up with that idea, parents would certainly veto it.

No, the culture of Halloween most certainly started with grown-ups. As adults, we cherish this holiday. Not only to eat all that leftover candy, but also to pass the message to the next generation that we can be whatever we dream of being.

For one day a year, this is true.

But what about all the others?

When the clock strikes midnight and the calendar shifts to November, we go from dressing like pumpkins to becoming them.

The slipper no longer fits. There’s a glass ceiling in its place.

I’m not talking about the glass ceilings formed by experience gaps, gender or ethnicity. Our society is taking some long overdue steps to shatter those barriers. (And it’s about time!)

No, I’m talking about the glass ceiling we’ve formed for ourselves.

For all our talk of aspirations, how much have we backed up that talk with action? For all the times we tell kids If you can dream it, you can do it, how often do we follow through?

Probably not as much as we’d like.

There are many times when our dreams might be untenable. Only the most talented baseball players make the major leagues. Only a chosen few can see their name in lights in Hollywood.

But there are plenty of other times that we make our dreams untenable.

You see, for all we make light of ghosts and goblins and spookiness, we all too often let fear hold us back. We let what could happen get in the way of what might be.

This is horribly unfortunate.

Fear only has power over our lives if we let it. The more we run from it, the more we turn our aspirations into daydreams.

Punting on our aspirations sets a poor example. One that the next generation feeds off of.

Over time, this makes it harder and harder for people to view their aspirations as a potential reality. The more we’re surrounded by a culture that self-imposes a glass ceiling, the more real that barrier becomes.

It’s time to break through.

Let’s go after our aspirations. Let’s inspire others to do the same.

Let’s use our actions, not our words, to promote a society where the sky really is the limit. One where we don’t have to resort to dressing up once a year for our soul to be free.

If we can do this, we can change everything.

Aspirations are powerful. Let’s use that power for the better.

Uncovering the Unknowns

There are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns – the ones we don’t know we don’t know.

These famous words were uttered by Donald Rumsfeld, the former United States Secretary of Defense.

The year was 2002. And barely five months after 9/11 shook America to its core, Rumsfeld was briefing the press. The topic? Whether Iraq was supplying weapons of mass destruction to terrorist groups.

Rumsfeld could have provided a boilerplate non-answer. He could have been a steel wall, hiding behind military clearances and other bureaucratic walls. He could have rattled off a bunch of jargon to throw us all of the trail.

But he didn’t.

Instead, Rumsfeld rattled off this now-iconic line.

Some ridiculed it. After all, this sound bite came off clunky and evasive. And once the U.S. did go to war in Iraq, the statement got even more scrutiny.

There were no WMDs, it turns out. Many members of our military lost their lives in a war we entered under faulty pretenses. And Rumsfeld’s line seemed to be the epitome of those pretenses.

Yet, if you strip away the politics and revisionist history surrounding the statement, you might find Rumsfeld’s words to be eerily profound.

I certainly do.

Three years ago, I started Words of the West with a purpose and a promise. The purpose was to share my truth through the power of the written word. The promise was to do so weekly.

For 156 articles, I’ve kept that promise. I’ve fulfilled that purpose.

But facts and figures doesn’t tell the complete story.

For the past three years I’ve taken heed of Rumsfeld’s words. I’ve delved into the world of unknown unknowns and made them a little less confounding.

You see, I’ve viewed every topic I’ve covered here as a chance to gain clarity. No matter what I’ve shared, I’ve learned even more through the process of putting it to paper.

For no matter how certain I seemed about a particular topic, I’d quickly learn that there was a lot I hadn’t been aware of.

There were plenty of unknown unknowns.

This was true for big idea topics. I didn’t know that the Rock Bottom paradox could be so pervasive. Or just how many challenges were that next great opportunity.

But it was just as true for retrospectives. I didn’t know that sharing my memories of 9/11 would help bring solace. Or that recounting all that went into my career switch would inspire confidence.

I didn’t know what I didn’t know. But now I do.

 

Words of the West has helped me grow. By sharing my truth, I’ve expanded my understanding of so many aspects of life. In a world that can often times be turbulent, I’ve been able to chart a steady course. One grounded in the musings I’ve shared with the world each week.

I’ve been blessed to undertake this journey. And blessed that you, the reader, have been able to take it with me.

My hope is that you’ve taken something valuable from these articles. That you’ve found some clarity. That you’ve uncovered an answer to your unknown unknowns.

I look forward to us exploring more of the unknown in the articles to come. To us making the unexplored and overlooked less confounding and more actionable. To us helping make the world a better place — even in some small way.

The journey has just begun. Come along.

Sunken Opportunities

How much do you know about sunk costs?

Perhaps you’ve heard of the sunk cost fallacy. That’s the false belief that you must salvage any remaining value from a decision gone bad. The illusion that there’s even anything to be salvaged in that situation.

The sunk cost fallacy leads us to hang on to items we have no purpose for. It causes us to maintain subscriptions we’ve never made use of. And it compounds poor decision making with more poor decisions.

The conventional wisdom is to ignore sunk costs. To throw out the baggage weighing us down and not think about the price tag.

But as with most concepts, this advice is far more straightforward on paper than in reality.

One reason for this is emotion. It’s difficult to make a logic-based decision when you let your feelings get in the way.

Decisions that didn’t go as planned carry an emotional toll. It’s hard to throw away the sensations that went through our hearts and minds when making our initial decision. And it’s especially difficult when money is involved in those decisions.

Our finances are tied to our feelings of security. Casting away something we spent our hard-earned money on is a bitter pill to swallow.

So, our emotions can lead us to hang on. Even when we know we shouldn’t.

Another reason why we hang on to sunk costs is to avoid the implication that we erred beyond reproach. That we failed, wholly and completely.

You see, we don’t like failure. It eats at us. It terrifies us.

This is why we’re so attuned to silver linings. It’s why we believe in moral victories.

We feel that if we can take away something from a bad experience to help us down the line, then perhaps the blunders will be worth it.

Of course, casting off sunk costs flies in the face of this theory. There’s nothing to take away. Just an opportunity to cut the dead weight and head on down the trail.

The idea echoes an entrepreneurial tagline: Fail fast and move forward.

But this might not be the right approach.

I certainly understand the benefits of starting anew. I recognize the power of progressing unencumbered by the ghosts of poor decisions past.

Yet, without a process in place to learn from our mistakes, we only assure that we will repeat them.

We will stay sloppy. We will remain wasteful. And we will build a culture that casts accountability aside.

This is not the type of world we want to live in. This is not the future we want to build.

But where do we draw the line? How do we reconcile between ignoring sunk costs and keeping ourselves from iterating and improving?

Some critical judgement is needed.

We must recognize that not all sunk cost situations are the same.

Some are predominantly the result of chance, of known risk. The forces that lay your resources to waste are beyond your control.

If you invest in a grill and deck chairs, and it rains all summer long, the cruel side of chance is to blame. Same deal if you buy a warm jacket and ski boots for your vacation in Colorado, only to encounter record high temperatures all week.

There is nothing to be learned from these misfortunes. Nothing that you could or should have done differently.

Risk is omnipresent and unpredictable. We can’t plan around it, nor should we try to.

Best to cast off the sunk costs and move forward.

On the other hand, many sunk cost situations are actually efficiency opportunities in disguise. They’re decisions you can’t have back, but might rethink the next time around.

Those season tickets you bought but didn’t use? That’s one of them.

You can’t get your money back, but you sure as heck can avoid repeating that decision next year. Cast off the sunk cost with discretion.

Same goes for any golden handcuffs situation you might find yourself in. Leaving those perks behind might be gut-wrenching. But knowing what to look for next time around can spare you the ignominy of dealing with the same situation later.

The key, then, is recognition. It’s taking a close look at those sunk costs and determining which ones are purely a matter of chance, and which ones provide an opportunity for growth.

It’s understanding the difference between letting go and learning. It’s coming to terms with the duality of purpose.

Getting to know this distinction is a worthwhile mission. One that allows tomorrow to be better than today.

So, don’t despair at sunk costs. There may be sunken opportunities within them.

The Danger Of Inaction

What is the cost of doing nothing?

Of standing pat? Of deciding good enough is good enough?

Sometimes the cost is not that high. The only real factor is opportunity cost — the value of possibilities that might have existed if we only went for them.

Other times the consequences can be grave, even deadly.

When armed forces are under attack, a lack of action can lead to mass casualties. One need only to see the end of Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End to get a cinematic view of this.

The implications of inaction are clear in this situation. But what about situations where they’re not as direct? How do we act then?

In a word: Poorly.

Consider this.

When we go out and have a good time, one companion is often in the middle of the action. Alcohol.

Booze helps us lighten up. It removes our inhibitions. It gets us feeling good.

And it’s a cultural staple. One inextricably woven into nearly all kinds of get-togethers.

But alcohol provides significant dangers. It affects our behavior, slows our response times and alters our decision making.

At their worst, these effects can ruin lives — or even end them.

Many of us learn about these dangers well before we take our first legal sip of alcohol. Drivers education classes are littered with warnings about drinking and driving. College orientations alert students to the dangers of binge drinking.

But even with these warnings in tow — not to mention the electronic “Don’t Drink and Drive” signs up and down the highway — we still make alcohol-induced decisions that put others at risk.

If those risks come to fruition, we have a ready-made excuse.

But I was drunk.

 This excuse is bogus, and even insulting to those harmed by alcohol-fueled behavior.

Having a few drinks shouldn’t give us a free pass to harm others. To victimize and traumatize. To deprive people of their God-given rights.

Yet, it does. Because we, as a society, let it.

We sanctify the act of throwing one back, or having a couple cold ones. Just as we sanctify the flawed principle of Let boys be boys.

We ignore the consequences of defending these principles, because we don’t want to live in a world that deprives us the change to indulge ourselves.

But the danger of inaction is grave.

It impinges justice. It silences victims. And it makes us all complicit in tragedy.

We can do better.

We can do right by those harmed by this behavior.

We can save countless future would-be victims from their fate.

But we can only do so by taking action. By destroying the façade that says having a good time is beyond reproach. By tossing out the flawed defense of youthful innocence.

We don’t need to give up drinking, as I have. We don’t need to put an end to partying.

But we need to lean in to accountability. We must hold everyone responsible for actions that harm others. We have to prevent the root cause of harm from being treated as an immunity defense.

The actions we take matter.

Inaction is no longer an option.

The Character Choice

He’s not a bad person. He just has a character flaw.

You might have used this line before. Or heard of someone else who did.

This line has been used for those who smoke or drink too much. For those who act out on occasion or demonstrate a bad temper. For those who lose interest or focus at times when it’s needed.

The point? That the most unsavory characteristics of our behavior can be written off, or explained away.

That the good can cancel out the bad. Or at least make us forget about it for a while.

It’s our way of lightening up. On focusing on the positives rather than dwelling on the negatives. On seeing the good in people rather than dwelling on the bad.

It’s why we have Boys Will Be Boys. Or Girls Just Want To Have Fun.

No harm, no foul.

Shame on us.

This attitude shrugs aside incidents that can ruin lives. It gives a free pass where none is warranted. It leaves us complicit in the abdication of fair treatment.

Worse still, it misinterprets what character truly means.

 

Character is not a flaw. It is a choice.

Think about that statement for a moment. Then think of someone you consider to have character.

What comes to mind?

The way they carry themselves, most likely. The way they act and the things they do.

But if your character role models are anything like mine, another word comes to mind as well.

Consistency.

High-character individuals don’t talk the talk. They walk the walk.

They live the values they embody. Every minute of every day.

There’s no room for flaws in judgment. Character is a choice they make, and one they commit to abide by at all times.

Showing up with the right attitude every day is not as noticeable as flying off the handle now and then. Taking the right actions is not always as noteworthy as screwing up.

Yet, over a wider time frame, it stands out.

People remember what they don’t see from high-character leaders. The lack of meltdowns, embarrassments and lapses in judgment. And that lack of red marks can garner respect and adulation.

Character is not a flaw. It is a choice.

So, how can we get there?

How can we aspire to improve our character? To live into the type of behavior we idolize?

We can start by kicking the free-pass to the curb. By no longer writing off lapses in judgment. By instead yearning for something greater.

For our legacy is measured by its entirety, not its majority.

When we reduce the threshold of acceptable behavior to that second level, we all stand to lose.

We can do better than that.

We must do better than that.

So, let’s stop compromising.

Character is not a flaw. It is a choice.

Choose wisely.