Analogies

I think in analogies. Often when I'm trying to explain something that's hard for me or someone I'm working with, I look to life to give me a hint. And as long as I'm listening (in other words, I'm prepared to hear what is said to me, even if it comes from a strange source), I usually get my hint or even the whole answer.

This happened to me this morning, but let me give you a bit of background. I have a lot of positive plans for 2010, but a few new projects are stalled, and I've been thinking all week about how to move forward. At the same time, worrying about them is using up time that could be put towards my on-going projects. What to do? Do I continue working on solving my new projects? Do I abandon them and put all my time towards my on-going projects? Do I simply give everything up and start over? Tough questions, especially this early into a new year.

Having spent a restless night, I got up too tired to think about this today. Taking Scarlett O'Hara's approach (for those of you who didn't take the advice in my last blog to watch some classic movies, Scarlett is the heroine of Gone with the Wind), I decided that I'd think about all this tomorrow...or more likely Monday since my weekend seems to be already filled with family stuff. To try to reduce some of the stress, I thought I'd spend a bit of time playing one of my favorite computer card games.

Now, I realize that I am horribly technology-retarded, and by reading that I still play card games on my computer, most of you are thinking "when will she get into the 21st century"? Well, as it turns out, this computer card game came in handy this morning, as it handed me the answer I was looking for. Without going into too many details, near the end of the game when you are about to lose, you have the option of doing a Ctrl-Z which undoes your last move. This allows you to try out a few options and back out if they don't allow you to continue on to win the game. It doesn't usually work, but it's better than giving up right away. As I was using this strategy (some of you might call it cheating, I call it strategy :-)), I kept thinking "no way, I'm not giving up, I'm going to win this stupid game". And then it happened...I won! Ok, bizarre, let's try this again. And I won again. And then it hit me!

BANG!!!!!

That's it! Determination and belief. Remember, we've talked about this before in this blog. Sometimes things are so obvious that we lose them in the midst of all our "complex" thinking. Maybe what is missing in the application of my plans is determination and belief. Regardless of whether I decide to continue on with my new projects or drop them and concentrate on my on-going projects, the point is that I need to BELIEVE that I will succeed, and then set my teeth in DETERMINATION and refuse to lose the game. Maybe get a little mad in the process, but also think about the card game: when a particular move doesn't seem to work, back up, reset and try another move. But the point is to win the game.

Ok, so I'm off to work again. Scarlett will just have to think about things tomorrow without me, I'll be busy trying another move. Maybe you'll be doing the same thing. I believe that it will work for you too. Good luck!

Classic movies

I've always been a fan of classic movies. My parents watched lots of movies when we were kids. Of course, in those days, you watched what was played on TV, when it was played (before the days of video stores, VCRs, video on demand, satellite TV and YouTube!). And regular TV stations actually played good movies, in fact they bid for the rights to play classics that were sure to draw an audience with the stay-at-home crowd.

So we'd often hear at the dinner table on a Friday or Saturday evening that a particularly good movie was going to be played later on. Movies like Lawrence of Arabia, How the West was Won, Gone with the Wind, War and Peace, Doctor Zhivago, Anna and the King of Siam (not to be confused with The King and I), The Lion in Winter, Bridge over the River Kwai...I could go on. These were always opportunities for us to stay up late to watch the movie until the end.

Now that I am living in a francophone environment, I realize that many people didn't have this same experience. So I am introducing my boyfriend to all these classics. We laughed last night when we noticed that at the beginning of Lawrence of Arabia, they play a musical overture to welcome the audience into the theatre...isn't that a much more pleasant introduction to the movie than the numerous commercials and trailers that they make you sit through today before you get to see the movie you actually paid to watch?

And then I got to thinking this morning: what a great way to embellish an education (yours or maybe your children's)! Of course, as the Arab tribes were fighting through Turkish-occupied territory on their way to Damascus, we pulled out the atlas to position ourselves in that part of the world. Right, there was the Nefud desert that T.E. Lawrence passed through the first time, then Sinai where he lost his compass and finally the route north. We also tried to remember the small amount of WWI history we had learned...unfortunately this was never part of my high school training; I guess I would have to take a university-level 20th century geopolitical history course to fill in the gaps.

The point is that you do learn a lot watching these movies. Things that allow you to put today's global events in perspective. And they inspire you to do more learning, maybe grab the atlas or a history book, or check out certain details on Wikipedia or some other web resource. Perhaps if we understood more about the topics that are the backdrop for these classic movies, we'd be in a better position to form opinions about today's current events.

So, if you are looking for something to fill a cold wintry evening, get a few friends together and rent one of these old classics. Make a point of pausing every once in a while to discuss what can be learned from what you've been watching. Oh, and don't forget to listen to the music!

Made for bigger stuff

Happy New Year to all of you! It's been a busy holiday season for me, as evidenced by my lack of blogging. But I've completed my annual planning and intend to be much more faithful to you readers in 2010.

Today's topic is inspired by my boyfriend's older son, a typical 14-year-old. There was a bit of frustration in the house this morning as we witnessed yet another time that he didn't bother to shut out the kitchen lights before leaving for school. And yet he has been told many times. I got to thinking, however, about how he processes the information we pass on about saving money on the electric bill and maybe doing our small part to save the environment. It's as if he doesn't process it at all. As if it's junk email that gets deleted before you even scan the contents... because of its title or sender, you KNOW it doesn't need to take any of your attention.

So, if turning out lights is junk mail to him, what does that mean? Given that this is a POSITIVE energy blog, I tried to think of a positive interpretation (rather than just sigh and try harder tomorrow). I got to thinking that maybe he's simply not made to pay attention to these small details in life. Maybe he's made for bigger stuff. There are many adults who pay absolutely no attention to detail, but achieve great things in life. I suspect Albert Einstein didn't bother to turn out the lights when he left a room. Neither did Leonardo or Michaelangelo (of course, they would have simply let their candles burn out). I bet Bill Gates doesn't think much about lights in a room, and while Warren Buffet is probably a fanatic for turning out lights, I suspect it's motivated much more by his frugal nature than actual attention to this small detail. All of these people have "people" who turn out lights for them. So maybe we need to focus on making sure that our 14-year-old plans to surround himself with people who will pay attention to these "insignificant" details for him and he'll be just fine.

What is the real point of this blog? It's that we often take things at face value and interpret them in our typical pessimistic or negative manner. It would be really easy to say that this 14-year-old is lazy...or doesn't listen to his father...or doesn't care about his impact on the rest of the family. What is more difficult is imagining something positive about this: maybe he IS the next Einstein? Maybe his brain is made for bigger stuff? If that's the case, we'd better stop distracting his genius by telling him to turn out the lights (which he will never do anyways) and start helping him fill his brain with ideas and dreams and confidence. Maybe our energy will be much more effective that way.

Oh, and I guess I'll just have to get used to shutting out the physical lights so that I can help turn on internal lights.

Have a great day!