Daily Ramblings – Motivation Monday – The Right Tools and Delegation

Tags

delegation, job, Monday, motivation, Productivity, Responsibility, tasks, Tools

Ever try to do something with the wrong tool? It’s frustrating isn’t it? Not only does it anger you while you are doing the task, you either avoid or dread having to do that task again. Having the right tool for the job is critical to motivation.

When I was working, I loved my job, but also loved the tools I used to do my job. I love a good tablet, phone, computer, and office gear. There’s nothing like digging into your work with a favorite tune playing on your phone with earbuds in, of course. There’s nothing like having a second screen with great apps on your tablet.

Regardless of what you do, there are tools available to complete the job. If you have the right ones–tools you really look forward to using–the job is even easier and actually kind of fun. It’s even more important when you are doing a new job or task. Investigate the tools others use to do a job. You’ll find that they use specific types of tools that make the job super easy. This combination of both fun and easy make the jobs or tasks ahead an absolute breeze.

Obviously, there are some jobs you just dread doing. They are boring, tedious, and do not take a lot of mental effort to complete. If you have staff working for you, delegate some of these tasks so that they can learn some of your job. It is your job as a leader to train your replacement, right? So, lighten your burden and pass off those tasks that others can do just as well as you can. This frees you up to focus on what you love to do, and gets the other jobs completed. Just remember: Delegation does not give up responsibility.

Recently, I had to put together some posters with QR codes for an event in Ann Arbor, Michigan. My organization was running a booth at their annual Art Fair. I did not have the tool to separate the first page of an e-book (PDF), but my sister did. She needs it for her job as a loan officer. She knocked out 7 PDFs in about 2 minutes. A last-minute request required me to do one more poster. Only this time, my sister was too busy to get it done in the time I had to get it done. Did I throw my sister under the bus and drop the ball? No. I found the tools I needed, and got the job done. I was responsible for getting this done for the event, not my sister. You see? I needed the right tool, and although I delegated the task to my sister, I was ultimately responsible for getting this done.

Well, that’s it for today, folks.

Have a great Monday!!

Until next time…

Dave

Daily Ramblings – Wisdom Wednesday – Eleanor Roosevelt

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Delegate, Eleanor Roosevelt, First Lady, Freedom, Responsibility, Strength, United Nations, WHM, Women

With the new day comes new strength and new thoughts.

Eleanor Roosevelt

Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people.

Eleanor Roosevelt

The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.

Eleanor Roosevelt

A woman is like a tea bag – you can’t tell how strong she is until you put her in hot water.

Eleanor Roosevelt

Freedom makes a huge requirement of every human being. With freedom comes responsibility. For the person who is unwilling to grow up, the person who does not want to carry his own weight, this is a frightening prospect.

Eleanor Roosevelt

If you’d like to learn more about the “first lady to the world”, here is her Wikipedia link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eleanor_Roosevelt

Have a great Wednesday, folks!

Until next time…

Dave

Daily Ramblings – Wednesday Wisdom – 5 Quotes

Tags

Character, honesty, Lincoln, Planning, preparation, president, Responsibility, The People, Truth, Wikipedia

In light of our upcoming Presidential inauguration, here some quotes from “Honest Abe”.

You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time.

Abraham Lincoln

Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe.

Abraham Lincoln

I am a firm believer in the people. If given the truth, they can be depended upon to meet any national crisis. The great point is to bring them the real facts.

Abraham Lincoln

I am not bound to win, but I am bound to be true. I am not bound to succeed, but I am bound to live by the light that I have. I must stand with anybody that stands right, and stand with him while he is right, and part with him when he goes wrong.

Abraham Lincoln

You cannot escape the responsibility of tomorrow by evading it today.

Abraham Lincoln

For those of you who are interested, here’s the Wikipedia page on Abraham Lincoln. I think you’ll find the article engaging, informative, and an example of one of our greatest presidents. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abraham_Lincoln Enjoy!

Until next time…

Dave

Daily Ramblings – Spiritual Saturday – Let People Be Who They Are

Tags

family, Freedom, Friends, good will, Responsibility, Spiritual Saturday, warm love

Our freedom stops where someone else’s starts. This line is called responsibility.

—Harold Klemp
The Language of Soul

People irritate us. Let’s be honest. Your husband, wife, mother, father, brother, sister, or long-time friend. They all do things that bug the crap out of us. The part we forget: We do things that bug the crap out of them too. Love people for who they are.

Now love has a few different levels, so to speak. Your love for your close family and friends is emotional and nostalgic. The relationships are close because you have so many shared experiences. Those outside of this circle get our good will. Many use the word love, but it is more about good will or a lack of feeling altogether. Sure you feel bad for someone that has experienced loss or a traumatic situation, but you aren’t as effected as you would be if a close family member or friend experienced the same thing.

As human beings, we are naturally empathetic. When you read about a family in your area dying in a house fire, you would naturally feel bad for the family. If the same disaster happened to your immediate family, it would be devastating.

You can’t control other people. People will do what they will do. All of us have blind spots. We all have that thing we could improve on. We don’t need to rub this in someone else’s face. In most cases, they’ll resist the change you suggest that much more, or they may increase what they do to bug you even more.

Let your loved ones breathe. Let them pursue the life they want to. Love them for who they are. Love them for the things that bug you. Love them for their idiosyncrasies, their flaws, their eccentricities. These things make them unique. They are endearing if you look at them in this fresh light.

When Harold talks about freedom stops where someone else’s begins, this is what he means. You should let no one impose change on you. The same follows for you and others. You do not have a right to make someone do something they do not want to do. So lighten up. Let your family and friends breathe. People will surprise you. They change. But they change when they want to and at the pace they are comfortable with. Mind your own garden. You and they will be a lot happier.

Until next time…

Dave

 

 

 

Daily Ramblings – Motivation Monday

Tags

Attitude, Responsibility, Self-control, Self-discipline, self-improvement

“There is only one corner of the universe you can be certain of improving, and that’s your own self.” – Aldous Huxley

Read more at https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/aldous_huxley_386738?src=t_motivational

Happy Monday!!

I hope everyone had a terrific weekend. It’s that time again—Motivation Monday!!! What do you control? What can you affect? You’ll find that the only thing you can control is you.

You can’t control your cube mate, you can’t control the other people on the road, you can’t control the attitude of the barista making your coffee. You can control your attitude. You can control what goes in your mouth and body. You can control your reaction to outside events and people. You can control what you read, what you listen to, and who you associate with.

Concentrate on the things you can control and your “circle of influence will increase”. Concentrate on the things you cannot control and your “circle of influence will decrease.” (Covey, 1989). Your circle of influence is composed of all the things you are in control of. Focus on your circle of influence and your life will turn around.

Some of you are working right now. Some of you are at home. Some of you are having a terrific day, while others dreaded going to work this morning. I’ve been there. I’ve also experienced the phenomenon that Covey (1999) addresses. I was more concerned about the things outside of me, rather than the ones inside.

It is so easy to play the victim. Why take personal responsibility when you can blame your parents, your siblings, your luck, or some other “outside” thing. Easy right? If there are all these outside things affecting my ability to perform it isn’t my fault. I am not responsible. Get it? This is why it is easy. This is why so many people fall into this trap. Taking responsibility is hard, but it is a necessary step to personal growth and effectiveness. The moment you own your life with all of its successes and failures will be the moment you begin to realize that you are in charge.

When you begin to realize that you have the power to change, the power to work on your weaknesses, the power to control your attitude and response to outside circumstances you will awaken to a new reality. A reality that you have complete control over. If there is something you do not like about yourself, read, study, learn how to make the change. There are articles, books, and YouTube videos that will show you how. You have all the power in the world to make the personal changes you want to make.

It’s up to you.

Until next time…

Dave

Daily Ramblings – Daily Quotes

Tags

Character, creativity, Emotions, Imagination, Responsibility, Wayne Dyer

“One of the most responsible things you can do as an adult is to become more of a child.” – Dr. Wayne. W. Dyer

This quote is terrific. Children are so open, so creative, so inherently happy—until they are socialized and their dreams and imagination dwindle away. To truly live, we have to capture that child-like curiosity, happiness, and imagination. This life can be a truly rich experience if we can only get these things back.

“I cannot always control what goes on outside. But I can always control what goes on inside.” – Dr. Wayne W. Dyer

This is about our internal attitudes and character. This eludes to one of yesterday’s quotes by Gandhi and Steven Covey. We cannot control what other people do, the weather, or world events. We can only control the way we react to these things. If you are unattached to things you will find that your life will become much less stressful and easier. If you are attached to things, it is like being an inflexible tree. When the winds of change come blowing, the inflexible tree will be snapped. The same things apply to us. We have to be flexible, take everything with a grain of salt, realizing that everything is in its rightful place in the worlds of God and that God will never, ever give us a problem we are not capable of handling.

“Remember that your imagination is yours and yours alone. You have the inborn capacity to use it in any way that you choose. No one else is responsible for your imagination. Anything placed in your imagination and held there ultimately becomes your reality.” – Dr. Wayne W. Dyer

Have you ever done the experiment of imagining biting into a lemon? This is one of the typical thought experiments I think everyone has been hit within their psychology 101 class. When you imagine biting into a lemon your mind communicates this to your body and you start to salivate. The same thing happens when we worry about things, get angry about things, feel afraid, or sad or any number of emotions. We create them. This all drifts down from our emotional level of thinking and comes right into the physical body.

If you want a pleasant and calm life, imagine a pleasant and calm life and let go of the negative things, the anger, the jealousy, the fear, the attachment to a thing, place, or an idea, the lust for things. If you can focus on positive things, things that you are grateful for, happy, or excited about, your life will follow these imaginative thoughts. It’s the way this world—your world—works.

I hope you enjoyed today’s quotes.

See you tomorrow!

Daily Ramblings – Daily Quotes

Tags

Anderson, Cummings, Gandhi, Integration, Responsibility

“Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony.” – Mohandas K. Gandhi

“Wellness is the complete integration of body, mind, and spirit – the realization that everything we do, think, feel, and believe has an effect on our state of well-being.” – Greg Anderson

“At the end of the day, you are solely responsible for your success and your failure. And the sooner you realize that, you accept that, and integrate that into your work ethic, you will start being successful. As long as you blame others for the reason you aren’t where you want to be, you will always be a failure.” – Erin Cummings

Today’s quotes revolve around integration and responsibility. Gandhi states that you can achieve happiness when you are integrated. Anderson states you can achieve wellness. Cummings gives us some advice about responsibility.

Of the three I gravitate toward Cummings. His advice is quite wise. Steven Covey offered the same kind of advice, when he stated, “The moment you think the problem is out there; that is the problem (paraphrased).” He speaks about personal responsibility and our need to understand that the problems we have are of our own creation. So true. Sometimes problems are created in our mind. We think we have a problem, someone else doesn’t see it. The same goes for happiness.

We can either choose to be happy or we can choose to be miserable. Happiness is not a journey; it is a state of mind. When someone tells me that when they do, get, or become something they’ll be happy, I pity them. Don’t get me wrong, goals are great things to go after, but not for the purpose of being happy. If you chase happiness, you’ll be chasing it your whole life.

Be happy today. It is nothing more than making a choice.

Until tomorrow…