Category Archives: motivation

Leaders Need Washboard Abs

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I supposed it has a real name, but I call it the finishing work. It is the work at the end of a project that takes it from being pretty good to being very exceptional. In most cases it is the final 10-15% of the work that could be done, but doesn’t necessarily have to be done. Few people tend to like do finishing work, so it becomes the natural separator in almost every experience that you have. You will find it is the difference between restaurants, websites, athletes, leaders and relationships.

I want washboard abs.  Although I workout 6-7 days a week and have completed several marathons, triathlons and an ironman, I still do not have them. Why? Because I hate sit-ups and being a conscientious, healthy eater. These two items are finishing work. So, even though I workout really hard, I am still short of one of my goals. So, someday soon I will have to discipline myself to drink no beer and take the extra 15 minutes at the end of each work out to put in some sit-ups.
* And, no, these are not a requirement for leadership, but it got you to read the article.

How about you? Do you cheat excellence in areas of your leadership, home, work or personal life because of finishing work? It’s tough, but it is what it takes to move areas in your life from ‘good’ to ‘awesome’.

Why You Hate Tim Tebow

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It is easy to hate optimism. It is even easier to hate a cheerful winner. Add in to the mix, “well, he’s not even that good”, and then you really need to hate Tim Tebow.

Sunday’s game was awesome! And yes, Tebow needs to be thankful that Marion Barber lost the game for the Bears. But as good as the game was, if you watched the post-game interview with Tim Tebow, you enjoyed the whole thing even more. Tebow’s smile was contagious. His appreciation for his entire team was authentic. His belief is unflappable (at least while he is winning). Why wouldn’t you want to have this guy as your teammate?

 Bottom line: Tim Tebow provides great drama and controversy AND he does it all from a positive perspective. His team rallies behind his leadership AND he wins. This is excellent leadership no matter your religious perspective.

* The hokey sort of Christians will make too much out ‘the message’ that they believe God wants to tell the world through Tim. Settle down. I am pretty sure God already sent the Messiah. #Christmas

Read the whole post game interview.
Consider Frank Bruni’s thoughts on Tebow’s optimism.

Encouragement Is For The Needy

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I am not a guy who needs huge doses of what people refer to as ‘encouragement’. No one has to get in my ear each morning and whisper sweet positive thoughts about the day so that I can feel like I have the power to get up, get going and survive. Maybe it’s because my mom did this enough for me as a kid. Or maybe it’s because I have tiger blood and am always ready to kick the day in the teeth like my dad. Who knows why, but encouragement is usually a macro concept for me, something that is very helpful in small doses from people who are relationally close. Give me just a few servings a year.

So what I am about to say is not me by nature.

My first ironman race (bib# 1553) was fueled by lots of small, simple, cheerful, vocal, and helpful pieces of encouragement given out by friends, strangers and other athletes. It was so weird and so cool. Shocked and overwhelmed is how felt during and post race. Even now, almost two weeks later, the encouragement from the day is still leaving an unforgettable impression on my race experience.

The encouragement came in the form of a simple shoulder to lean on when my legs were wobbly getting out of the swim. My friend Greg was volunteering, he spotted me as I ran by his station and shouted “hey Russell!”. Transition volunteers did their role with an unmistakeable spirit of service, trying to help me excel as an athlete, and it fueled my day. A friend and running partner, Amy, came out and shouted support on the bike course. Another friend saved my bacon. Steve volunteered at the bike transition. Out of over 2,500 athletes he met me and took my bike to it’s stand while I went to change for my run. Steve noticed that I left my race timing watch on my bike and took the initiative to bring it to me as I left for the run. Amazing. And Amy, she found me again on the run and chatted positively about my performance as she jogged with me through an aide station. And the finish… WOW!, nothing like it. Friends, acquaintances, strangers, volunteers… they celebrated with me in the achievement. Their joy in my accomplishment seemed to almost match my joy. Maybe they liked seeing my pain and suffering, but I prefer to think that they were celebrating with me.

I could write about so many more encouraging experiences from the day. I think you see my point. Everyone needs encouragement. Placed at the right time during the hardest struggles and it can be the most important thing you ever give to another human being.

I have so much to learn.

* I am very grateful for the ironman stud Christian Isakson and his irreplaceable coaching, friendship and encouragement through this monster effort.

Personalized Anti-fear Training

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Leaders conquer fear… So why not personalize it for your own training purposes? My thought process: If you get used to taking on your personal fears then you will be better prepared to take on fears in your professional, leadership life as well.

I don’t know of many everyday fears, but the ones I have I want to conquer. Don’t ask me when… I will get to each of them in due course. As a normal course of life, I try to take 1 fear off my list each year. A current & complete list of my life’s remaining fears:

  • Surgery with anesthesia - Any kind of surgery will do, but particularly I am fearful of life threatening or serious surgeries. I am going to take on this one when it comes and I don’t plan on scheduling it.
  • Sky-diving - Seems easy enough but just last week I read an article about this retiree dying while out for a recreational ‘jump’.
  • Bungee jumping - Similar to sky-diving, but instead of a parachute it’s a rubber-band around the leg. Who thinks of these things?
  • Solo wilderness camping - This needs to be 2+ nights out in the wild, not camping in an RV at the local KOA, although I might use that as a ‘building-up-to-it’ type of training experience.
  • Self-reliant ocean sailing - The correct terminology I am not sure of; solo sailing I think. If a 16 year old can do this, then heck, why can’t I? I am thinking my late-40′s and the Caribbean island chain as part of my early planning.
  • Noodling - Nothing about the swamp, sticking my arm into submerged caves and letting a very large animal swallow a necessary appendage sounds like a rational sporting activity. And the ‘experts’ seem crazy and most likely suffer from in-breeding.
  • Scuba caving - Combining two fears I have already mostly conquered make for an all together natural ascension to eradicating them from my conscience.
  • Everest Summit - Like the sailing, this one will take time and tons of training not to mentioned a certain amount of ‘odds’ being on my side.
  • War / hand-to-hand combat for my life  - Not much needs to be said here. I will not seek this one out, but I resolve to not back away when the moment presents itself.

* Perhaps I haven’t thought of a few things that should be on this list but are not. Feel free to hit me with fears that I have not yet considered…

Richard Petty Race Experience – 160mph – the day after Dan Weldon died on the same track.

Not Me but We, Not Mine but Ours.

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Me – Mine – I

When a leader uses these words it kills the concept of ‘team’ for those he is dependent on.

You unnecessarily enter lonely territory when you use personal nouns to describe the ownership of the venture, organization or project. You push people away rather than inviting them in. Have confidence in yourself. If you are an exceptional, or even good leader, everyone already knows that they are dependent on your leadership for the organization, project or mission. Share your achievements with others and it invites them to do more ‘winning’ with you.

By the way, have you every noticed that successful authors work really hard at their acknowledgements. Why do you think that is?

What does a leader do with their free time?

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Teddy Roosevelt hunted big game, started a cattle ranch, explored the world on horseback. He read like a maniac, was considered a first rate Naturalist and world class authority on Naval strategy. He wrote over 35 books. He did this all in his spare time.

Every great U.S. President has a “free time” resume comparable to his.

Translation – If your free time is sucked up by video games, reality TV and drinking parties, then good luck to you with your aspirations to make a significant difference in the world. Make a plan. Pursue a worthy challenge. Pour yourself out. Start a business. Become an expert in a new category. Expand your mind. Strengthen your body. Suck the life out of the hours you have at your disposal.

Give then maybe you can take.

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It’s a tough economy, I get it. Certainly you should be maximizing your network find your next gig, you always want to explore the limits of your options. Unfortunately, it is the rare person that GIVES before they TAKE. Relationships have been compared to bank accounts… you can’t make withdrawals when you have not made investments. When my phone rings, email lights up or wall gets hit with a message, I put you into one of the two categories, giver or taker. It’s easier for me to be motivated to help the givers. BTW, it also translates into what kind of employee or leader people perceive you will be.

You Should Fool Around

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“Stop fooling around!” Can’t you just picture the agitated and harassed face of one of your elementary school teachers? Things haven’t changed just because we have gown up, it’s just a new person saying the same sentence. Unfortunately though, the person who now usually says it to you IS you. Stop it. Your growth in leadership is stagnant because you aren’t fooling around. The best ideas and some of your brightest opportunities are waiting for you in those forbidden moments. A next great step in your leadership, art and your life purpose will come from fooling around on the side of what you are already doing.

So…. start fooling around… with ideas, business concepts, dreams, leadership and even your current job.
Have fun.
Be ridiculous, like when you were a kid playing with your toys.
Include some smart & creative friends.
Dream big without boundaries.
Put the ideas down on paper.
Make a sketch.
Fiddle with a name and logo.
Make time to fool around once or twice a week.
Knock out some of the details in a list with categories.
List out the possibilities
Do a little research.
Put together a possible budget.
Use your imagination.
Make a couple of phone calls.
Share some of your best ideas with more of your smart friends; ask for their thoughts, their collaboration, advice and expertise.
Maybe, just maybe, you’ll come up with something huge.

My favorite time & places to start fooling around:
- While smoking a cigar with a sharp friend.
- On a hike or during a mountain bike ride.
- Online through a google doc.

Warning! You won’t ever come up with the next cool thing by just doing what you do every day, so find that extra time to start fooling around.

Warning!! Some of the best “next” things that you could be doing end up dieing because you won’t go work hard on them.

My Unscientific Theory of Forming New Habits

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30minutes x 3days x 4 weeks = solid foundation for a life changing new habit.

[disclaimer] I don’t have any scientific data to prove this, but I do have plenty of real world experience. [end disclaimer]

So, it’s just my personal working theory, but I believe that if you really want to form a new life changing habit it is as simple as dedicating yourself to a new discipline for 30 minutes a day, for 3 days a week over the course of 4 weeks.

I have tried this theory on both exercise and on work projects. This devoted time has been applied and worked with my children in academics and also household responsibilities. I have been witness to this simple principle transforming people’s spiritual lives.

Here’s why I think that it works.

30 minutes
It is not a long enough segment of time to be initially demotivated from trying it.
It is enough time to separate a good intention from a little bit of hard work.

3 days of a given week
This is less than half the week, so it doesn’t leave you with the sensation that you are doing something that you don’t yet “every day”. It’s a tolerable rhythm, it allows for a weekend and yet gets you going in the direction of discipline.

4 weeks
Make it to the the end of the month and you feel like “holy crap!, I just did that for a whole month and it wasn’t that hard”. It is a long enough segment of time to feel a true sense of success and also a long enough span to see some true gains.

I am going to apply this theory for the next 4 weeks to reading. I already read, but it is inconsistent at best, and usually comes in unscheduled bunches of time. Reading is one of the first things to get pushed aside during busy seasons. For me, reading isn’t a habit, it’s more like a good intention that I sometimes do. I know that if I were to read more that it would benefit my personal, spiritual and business life.

You try it with me.

Pick a category… anything.
Help me test my theory of the next 4 weeks.
I’ll post my updates here in the comments of this blog.

When is Quitting an Option?

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With every endurance race that I have participated in there has always come a point where I feel like quitting. In my first triathlon it was in the first 5 minutes of the swim. In fact, in all the triathlons I have competed in it is always during the swim that I want to quite… it must be something to do with the early morning anxiety and getting kicked in the face while trying to breath and not suck down water.

Sunday I completed my first marathon with a finishing time of 3:33:04; the pace was 8:07min per mile. The morning started out in the pitch black with the rain pouring in downtown Portland. I felt like quitting before I began… seriously, who really wants to run in the pouring rain? I felt like quitting when my legs began to hurt at mile 3. I felt like quitting again at mile 5 when I was already breathing heavy and was certain I couldn’t keep my goal pace up for 21 more miles. When the marathon route diverged from the half-marathon route it was tempting to go the shorter distance. But, the most challenging moment came at 12.5 miles. It was a slight downhill section, I was cruising nicely along and taking a sip of a carb-loaded sports drink when I hit a unapparent dip in the road and tweaked my left knee. Just one misstep out of what must have been thousands. Pain shot through my knee and up my leg. I cringed and faltered. I knew I had to keep striding, for if I stopped I was almost certain I wouldn’t get going again, mentally or physically. For the next couple of miles I tried to run the pain out of my mind and out of my leg, but nothing nagged me more than the thought of quitting.

Quitting was never really an option. I had too much invested leading up to Sunday. Too many miles logged, too many early mornings, too many damn hot days in AZ, too many friends who knew I was running, too many fellow competitors & training partners who were awaiting results, too much was personally at stake. My kids were waiting to hear. And, even though it was my first marathon, they thought I had a chance to ‘win’, since “why else would you run dad?”

Sometimes, quitting isn’t an allowable option. When you make a heavy personal invest in something you believe in it becomes THE driving competitive factor. Nothing will stop you short of your goal… except maybe death, or some very uncontrollable circumstance. Have you experienced this? Are you personally invested that deep in a mission or goal? What keeps your from giving yourself to something so completely?

(Special thanks to my wife, Jerome Hawkins, and Dave Skogebo for their part in helping me accomplish this goal!)