Risley Ranch

What's your "last lecture"?

A friend just emailed me a video of Randy Pausch on Oprah.  It's been viewed millions of times.  Randy has become an Internet star, but not because he wanted to be.  He's a professor from Carnegie Mellon who's dying from pancreatic cancer.  He gave a not-so-hypothetical last lecture to one of his classes in September 2007.  It was very motivational.  Not in a Zig Ziglar kind of way.  But in a real, down-to-earth kind of way.  I'm always amazed at people like this.  People who can have such a great attitude in the face of great challenges.  I'm just glad there are people like this.  They make the rest of us better.

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I can only imagine

Over at our Barkley Online Community, a colleague (Scott Loewen) posted the following passage from Sports Illustrated and a link to this video.  I was so overwhelmed by it I made this comment:

"I don't think I can express in words what I'm feeling from watching this. I've seen motivational speakers (some of them handicaped), read motivational books and watched motivational videos, but that may be the single-most touching thing I've ever seen in 37 years of life. I feel engergized and like a complete failure at the same time. As I sit here in a hotel room in San Antonio, watching my son sleep, I wonder if I would have it in myself to do such a thing for him. Am I man enough? From what cosmic well does this father draw such strength? And how in the world can I ever complain again about anything in my life?"

Strongest Dad in the World
[From Sports Illustrated, By Rick Reilly]

I try to be a good father. Give my kids mulligans.  Work nights to pay for their text messaging. Take them to swimsuit shoots. But compared with Dick Hoyt, I suck. Eighty-five times he's pushed his disabled son, Rick, 26.2 miles in marathons. Eight times he's not only pushed him 26.2 miles in a wheelchair but also towed him 2.4 miles in a dinghy while swimming and pedaled him 112 miles in a seat on the handlebars-- all in the same day. Dick's also pulled him cross-country skiing, taken him on his back mountain climbing and once hauled him across the U.S. on a bike. Makes taking your son bowling look a little lame, right? And what has Rick done for his father? Not much--except save his life.

This love story began in Winchester , Mass. , 43 years ago, when Rick was strangled by the umbilical cord during birth, leaving him brain-damaged and unable to control his limbs. ``He'll be a vegetable the rest of his life;'' Dick says doctors told him and his wife, Judy, when Rick was nine months old. ``Put him in an institution.'' But the Hoyts weren't buying it. They noticed the way Rick's eyes followed them around the room. When Rick was 11 they took him to the engineering department at  Tufts University and asked if there was anything to help the boy communicate. ``No way,'' Dick says he was told. “There's nothing going on in his brain.''

"Tell him a joke,'' Dick countered. They did. Rick laughed. Turns out a lot was going on in his brain.

Rigged up with a computer that allowed him to control the cursor by touching a switch with the side of his head, Rick was finally able to communicate. First words? “Go Bruins!'' And after a high school classmate was paralyzed in an accident and the school  organized a charity run for him, Rick pecked out, “Dad, I want to do that. ''Yeah, right. How was Dick, a self-described “porker'' who never ran more than a mile at a time, going to push his son five miles? Still, he tried. “Then it was me who was handicapped, ''Dick says. ``I was sore for two weeks.'' That day changed Rick's life. "Dad,'' he typed, "when we were running, it felt like I wasn't disabled anymore!''

And that sentence changed Dick's life. He became obsessed with giving Rick that feeling as often as he could. He got into such hard-belly shape that he and Rick were ready to try the 1979 Boston Marathon. "No way,'' Dick was told by a race official. The Hoyts weren't quite a single runner, and they weren't quite a wheelchair competitor. For a few years Dick and Rick just joined the massive field and ran anyway, then they found a way to get into the race officially:  In 1983 they ran another marathon so fast they made the qualifying time for Boston the following year.

Then somebody said, ``Hey, Dick, why not a triathlon?'' How's a guy who never learned to swim and hadn't ridden a bike since he was six going to haul his 110-pound kid through a triathlon? Still, Dick tried.

Now they've done 212 triathlons, including four grueling 15-hour Ironmans in Hawaii . It must be a buzzkill to be a 25-year-old stud getting passed by an old guy towing a grown man in a dinghy, don't you think? Hey, Dick, why not see how you'd do on your own? "No way,'' he says. Dick does it purely for "the awesome feeling'' he gets seeing Rick with a cantaloupe smile as they run, swim and ride together.

This year, at ages 65 and 43, Dick and Rick finished their 24th Boston Marathon, in 5,083rd place out of more than 20,000 starters. Their best time'? Two hours, 40 minutes in 1992--only 35 minutes off the world record, which, in case you don't keep track of  these things, happens to be held by a guy who was not pushing another man in a wheelchair at the time. "No question about it,'' Rick types, "My dad is the Father of the Century.''

And Dick got something else out of all this too. Two years ago he had a mild heart attack during a race.   Doctors found that one of his arteries was 95% clogged. "If you hadn't been in such great shape,'' one doctor told him, "you probably would've died 15 years ago.''

So, in a way, Dick and Rick saved each other's life.

Rick, who has his own apartment (he gets home care) and works in Boston , and Dick, retired from the military and living in Holland , Mass. , always find ways to be together. They give speeches around the country and compete in some backbreaking race every > weekend, including this Father's Day. That night, Rick will buy his dad dinner, but the thing he really wants to give him is a gift he can never buy.

"The thing I'd most like,'' Rick types, "is that my dad sit in the chair and I push him once.''

Time for a cool change

In his book The World Is Flat, Thomas Friedman talks about the new skills people in America will need to compete in the future.  One primary skill will be adaptability.

"Being adaptable in a flat world, knowing how to 'learn how to learn,' will be one of the most important assets any worker can have, because job churn will come faster, because innovation will happen faster," Friedman writes.

So how do you become more adaptable?  By becoming completely comfortable with constant change. 

I think it's human nature to resist change.  The familiar is comfortable.  Routine is reassuring.  Predictability is safe.  But if the world is constantly changing, and our workplaces are constantly changing, it's it a bit maddening to be in conflict with that change?

Although I believe I'm a change agent and able to cope well with change, my wife and I took a good look at our lives on the six-hour drive to my parents this past weekend, and it's pretty clear we're the poster children for routine.  "Rut" is the word my wife used.  So we committed to getting out of the rut and becoming more comfortable with constant change.  (With a four-year-old in our family, you think we would have figured out by now that change is the new normal anyway.)

We decided to start slow and get some quick wins.  So we made a list of all the things we want to do differently in the next few weeks.  Here's some of the items from our list:

• Trade cars -- I'll drive hers to work, she'll drive mine.
• Sleep on opposite sides of the bed -- tried it last night.  It was tough.  I've been sleeping on the same side of the bed for 12 years.  If you think it's easy, give it a try tonight.
• Have lunch with someone I've never had lunch with before.
• Rearrange our furniture.
• Write a letter to someone -- a hand-written letter on real paper with a real pen.
• Read a magazine I've never read before.
• Run a different route (this is my wife's; I don't run).
• Drive a different way to work.
• Take Joe to a park we've never been to before.
• Listen to new radio station.
• Eat a type of food we've never eaten before.
• Pick one night a week were there's not videos, no TV and just listen to jazz all night.
• Pay the person's tool behind me in line every once in awhile, or feed an empty parking meter so someone doesn't get a ticket.

They're little things, but little things matter.  And if we can keep this up, we'll be varying our routine so often that variance will be the new routine.  And I believe that has to make us more adaptable, more open to change.

Please steal our ideas if you want, or add to the list.

There's no such thing as can't

It was 1993.  Two years out of college.  I was living in Lawrence with three buddies, two of which were going to law school.  I was heavy into self-help books at the time.  You know, Tony Robbins and Stephen Covey.  Especially Covey.  The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People is still one of the most important books I've ever read.

It's March, and I said to one of my buddies, "Hey, let's party on Saint Patrick's day."

"I can't," he said.  "I've got to study."

This buddy -- let's call him Shon, because that's his name -- is one of my best friends.  He's smart.  And cool.  And competitive.  And stubborn.  So I see this situation as an opportunity to engage him in debate about an issue I learned from Covey (and still firmly believe today, in fact).

"You mean you don't want to, not you can't," I said.

"No," he said, "I want to, but I can't because I have to study."

"Well really you don't HAVE TO study," I said.  "I mean, you could blow it off or study before we party or study after we party."

"No, I can't," he said.  "That wouldn't be responsible."

"There's no such thing as can't," I said.  "There's only choices -- only priorities.  You're choosing to study instead of going to party with me.  You're prioritizing your study above partying with me.  And that's cool, but recognize it for what it is."

We argued for three days.  I pulled out books and quoted from them.  I tried different approaches.  Our other two roommates were sick of us.  But neither of us relented.  And to this day, I'm still right.

So last week I asked one of my work colleagues, "You want to go to lunch?"

"I can't," she said.  "I've got to get something to the client by 2 p.m."

"You mean you don't want to," I said....

It wasn't a three-day debate.  But I did tell her the story of the infamous "There's No Such Thing As Can't" debate of 1993.  I don't know if I convinced her.

But I'm still right.

Waiting and presence experiment

I finally got around to trying Johnnie's experiment.  I passed out Chris Corrigan's post about "waiting" to an an internal team at the start of a weekly meeting.  I just asked everyone to read it.  I didn't say why.  Then I asked for everyone's reactions.

On person said it reminded him of the feeling he'd had a funerals.  Another said the child-birth experience was applicable to him.  I said it reminded me of being in "the zone."  You know, that place we all go to when we're really into something we enjoy doing, and time just flys by and we don't notice it or anything around us.  Athletes get in the zone all the time.  Sadly, many in the corporate world don't.

There wasn't much discussion beyond that, and I blame myself for that.  I tend to be a task-master when it comes to client work, so something like this was completely out of context for this group, and somewhat out of character for me.  But perhaps that's exactly what we need more of. 

DO try this at home

Our PR firm is conducting an all-day, off-site planning meeting this Friday.  We've hired Michael Carter of YNIKA Consulting LLC (stands for "You're Not In Kansas Anymore) as a facilitator.  Based on our prep work with him, I'm expecting an interesting, productive day.

One of the things he's asked us to do to prepare is to simply "be" for 20 minutes each day:

"I want you to do some training prior to the workshop.  Each day between now and Friday (each day, not each weekday), I want you to find a quite place (no TV, no cell, no pets, no spouse, no children)  to sit for 20 minutes.  Sit in a chair or on a pillow on the ground.   Do not lay down.  Over a two (sic) minute period I want you to disengage from your discursive (thought) mind by one of three methods: count your inhalations and exhalations up to ten (in is "1", out is "2" and so forth to "10" then start over until 20 minutes is up), count only your exhalations up to ten then start over until you have completed the session, do not count at all but only be aware of your breadth (this is very difficult as it means being able to follow your breath through the entire cycle - if you have no experience at sitting, please do not use this method initially) or use a mix of these three.

This is not meditation.  It is a practice from the East that has been in use more than likely in some form since the first night fire was constructed by homo sapiens.  It is not a religious exercise.  It is training for the mind.  Whatever else you may do to train your mind, add this to your daily routine over the next week.

Thoughts will arise during the time you sit.  You are not to judge them in number or content or relative to your self image, ego, what your mom might think, etc.  If you notice them, simply let them be and return to your breadth (sic).

I do not want you to assume this is some sort of New Age, hippie dippy, feel good, liberal, mystical exercise.  When I say it is key to gaining useful results from the workshop, I am very serious.  It is the most important preparation relative to the overall goal."

Think this is easy?  Try it -- it's harder than hell!  Trying to find 20 minutes alone is the first challenge.  And then trying to keep your mind still that long is almost impossible (at least for me).  You become very aware of the soundtrack playing in your head.  The randomness of thoughts.  The noise. 

How did my life get so busy I can't just sit and be for 20 minutes?

EI in Blink?

On Crossroads Dispatches today, Evelyn Rodriguez points to part of an on line dialog on Slate between Jim Surowiecki, author of The Wisdom of Crowds, and  Malcolm Gladwell, author of Blink.  A Gladwell comment is very EI-like:

"One of the key arguments in my book is that human beings think in two very different ways. Sometimes we consciously and carefully gather all facts, trationally sort through them, and draw what we take to be a rational conclusion (the Standard Model). And sometimes we reach conclusions unconsciously—our mind quickly and silently sorts through the available information and draws an immediate judgment, which may be done so quickly and so far below the level of awareness that we may have no understanding of where our conclusions came from. I call this Rapid Cognition. I think the Rapid Cognition Model needs to be taken far more seriously—that it's smarter and more sophisticated and certainly more influential than we generally give it credit it for. So, like you, I'm arguing for a broadening of our understanding of what good decision-making looks like."

An example of emotional intelligence

I've been reading Doc Searl's blog since he started it, but I've only met him once, and we had a two-minute conversation.  Still, I think he's one of the most emotionally intelligent people I "know."  You can just feel it in his blog posts or hear it in his voice in a podcast.

And in one of his posts yesterday, he confirmed my belief:

"Many years ago, when I wrote the now long-lost Searls Laws, the first was "Logic and reason sit on the mental board of directors, but emotions cast the deciding votes."

That's EI in a nutshell.

What's your EQ?

Emotional intelligence is critical for developing and growing successful relationships.  To some people, this may seem obvious.  To many people (especially us left-brain dominated, rational/logical types), this is news.

I was convinced of this two years ago when I was turned on to the whole EI subject by my good friend Jenne.  She gave me Danial Goleman's book, invited me to the book club she started at our company, and I was hooked. 

This week I started reading it for the third time.  In two years, Jenne has successfully evangelized the importance of EI for our company so much so that our senior management has called it one of our most important initiatives.  EI principles are part of our evaluations.  Every person in our company has had an EI 101 training session from Jenne.  And her work has spawned other evangelists, like me, who are now leading our own book clubs within the company so we can expose more of our partners to the power of this idea.

We're in the relationships business -- creating relationships between our client's and their stakeholders.  And relationships start with people.  If EI is critical to successful relationships, we need the most emotionally intelligent people on the planet working at our shop.  I'm proud of our company for recognizing this fact, and I'm proud of Jenne for making it happen.