10 ‘Life is Hard’ Truths

You can have a good, enjoyable life. Even though life is hard we smile. Here are hard earned truths about life after 60 years of trials & errors.

1. Relationships & love are more important than wealth and fame:

Family and friends have helped me though job losses, bankruptcy, relocations, illnesses, grief, and breakups. Plus celebrated my successes. Be Kind. Listen when someone is having a bad day. (You don’t need to solve it.) Celebrate their successes. Eat together even if vegan. Have stopped at McDonald’s later, and enjoyed strange new meals with friends.

2. Help Others, Volunteer and Support Charities:

No possessions will make you happier than a kid asking you to tie their shoes or for a hug. Neighbors needing a hand with a project. Welcoming people. Doing grunt work at a volunteer event. Helping people move. Can’t pick up as much, but gotten better at packing. Always a contribution you can do.

3. Be Grateful:

What went right today? Who said hi? Write it down or review them going to bed. Most of us focus on our few mistakes or challenging people. Happy people look for good moments to savor and smile more.

4. Spend much less than you make:

You don’t need everything you want. You need peace of mind. Avoid impulse buys. When you get raises, increase how much you put into retirement or emergency funds. You will eventually need them.

5. Learn new skills: 

Be horrible at first, and work hard to be bad at it. Fail often. Became a writer because writing terrible first drafts, then edit & edit some more. Not because I was a natural. Still can’t spell nor type well. We get better.

6. Travel to see people or new places:

Go to parties. Smile. Meet new people. Vacation somewhere new. Attend weddings and funerals. Always make the funeral.

7. Politics are not important to your life. Turn off the news to be happier:

Most news is sensationalistic opinions to make you emotional. Neither President Trump nor Clinton would change my day today. (Voted 3rd party).

What makes you happy? Do it.

8. Be very kind. People do not want to be corrected, lectured, nor feel guilty:

If you try, you will become people they and I run from. No one needs negativity. People need to be understood. Besides we are all wrong more than we care to admit.

9. Hire people to do what you can’t:

See your doctor for physicals and illnesses above the common cold. Learn from a therapist how to cope better. Recommend the good service pros to people. Do what you are good at.

10. God Loves You:

He wants you to have a relationship with Him. Not scold you for your failings. He knows, forgives and loves you unconditionally. Be open and God will be revealed to you.

This one makes it easier to do 1 – 9. The stress goes away.

American Suicide Madness

Dedicated to Tyler Hilinski, the Junior Washington State quarterback who committed suicide. Prayers and sympathy to his family, friends and fans. Same prayers and sympathy for all those who lost a loved one from this same disease.

No I don’t know Tyler, and have no idea why a successful, popular young man thinks something is so horrible he can’t recover from it. Don’t know if it was a relationship, illness, social media, bullies, public embarrassment, being a burden, or afraid of the future. Fear is a powerful motivation.

He is not alone, nor is it a young man’s disease. Per AFPS.org Middle age men 45-54 have the highest suicide rate, followed by senior men over 85. Nor are they alone, 44,965 people die every year. For every death, there are 25 attempts. More men die, and more women try to die. The rate has been increasing over the last 10 years.

Nor is suicide the only symptom in our society. Drug addiction and overdoses are rising. Over 600,000 people died of overdoses, and the rate has been increasing for 16 years per the CDC. No one know how many overdoses are suicides versus accidental if they don’t leave a note.

Most people who try suicide really don’t want to die. Reports from Golden Gate jumpers have reactions like “I made a mistake” and “I want to live.” These people wanted someone to talk about their problems, to know problems could be fixed, or to just feel love or understanding.

Treatments of metal health issues are not working. Not enough people are identified soon enough. If someone wants treatment, there are not enough beds. The stigma of admitting you have a problem stops people from asking for help. Michael Phelps the gold medal swimmer contemplated suicide after the 2012 Olympics and his 2014 DUI arrest due to depression and anxiety. Fortunately he got help and is now speaking out to others to get help.

What can we do? Pay attention when someone changes his or her behavior drastically. Don’t be afraid to bring it up. Remind them we all have bad days and trials in our lives. Have had to overcome bad years, bad business decisions, and bad relationships in my life. Am not alone.

The main thing people in stress do is focus on their problems. Thinking about the people who care about us, respect us and love us are the antidote to issues. Spend time helping someone. Play with children in your life. Smile and greet people even when you don’t feel like it. Acting as if you are well is often a great step forward.

We have to look out for our outlook on life, and we have to look out for family, friends, co-workers and loved ones with challenges. Let them know you care. Remind them daily. And if they are still struggling, get them to professional help. Therapy with medication is successful 9 out of 10 times getting people healthy.  If the first therapist doesn’t fit with you, try another until you succeed. Do what you can where you are. And know we love you.

The Future of Our Work

We are entering a new time period. Many of us have lived through the Information Age, we are now entering the Automation Age. The combination of Artificial Intelligence with Robotics is changing our world.

This did not start recently. Been working with robots since graduating college in 1978. Computers since 1970 (more or less). Artificial intelligence goes back to mythology, and really started with Dartmouth College in the Summer of 1956 (My birth year). Autopilots were invented and demonstrated in 1914 by Lawrence Sperry. This saved wear and tear on pilots enabling longer flights. Also freed up pilots for more important tasks like navigation or bombing. Modern autopilots handle all phases of flight including taxi, takeoff, climb, cruise, descent, approach, and landing. Next step will be cargo planes without human intervention.

What is happening now is different technologies are reaching a level of maturity that will change the world. Software programing has better analyzing and self learning. Sensors are more effective, have more range and cost less. Battery life improved as weight went down. Our cell phones are mini computers. The future will be mobile.

Automation with artificial intelligence will replace most repetitive, difficult or dangerous work. Ships will not need pilots or crews for weeks on the oceans. Deliveries will not need truck drivers. Taxis, Uber & Lyft will not need drivers. Electric vehicles do not need all the maintenance of gas & diesel motors. Mechanics, Miners and Farmers will not be put at risk of injury or death to work.

But this will go further. Bookkeepers will not be needed to support accountants with artificial intelligence. Taxes will be calculated automatically. Pharmacist technicians will not count pills or type labels. Like the secretaries of old, these positions will fade away. Estimates are 20% to 40% of current blue & white collar jobs will go away.

Like the last new ages brought challenges. Moving to cities was uncomfortable for many from family farms. New skills had to be learned. Familiar places were missed. We adjusted to change. When computers came into the office, more skills were learned as responsibilities changed.

 What will be different this time is the speed of the change is faster. Technologies are accelerating and new skills are replacing old ones.

How to have job security? Keep learning and being productive. Take more responsibility. Automation and computers are not as good as with people skills. They can better maintain an algorithm for repetition. Creativity, sales and innovation are not strengths of Artificial Intelligence. Those require people. No reason it can’t be you.

Focusing on What is Important

Productive workers are not the busiest worker. They are the people who focus where a difference can be made. It is surprising the management miss this simple concept.

Have seen managers reward workers who show up on time and crank out volumes of simple, repetitive work. Easy to do because these people are not encountering hard problems that require manager’s time & attention. They generate good metrics and free your time.

However your most valuable employees tackle the more difficult work. They are not going to crank out numbers fixing typos. They do research. They negotiate with other departments, suppliers and customers to find good solutions.

Managers have ignored female coworkers contributions I have worked with. It’s because they don’t pay attention to their informally teaching coworkers skills, and ignore how difficult are the issues they tackle. It creates resentment and often leads to your best people leaving.

An Insurance Company rewarding their best salesman. This company focused on the metric of sales calls per agent. The vice president giving the award note the best salesman only made half the sales calls per the goal. “Can you imagine how many sales he would of made if he met the sale call goal?”

The agent responded “Can you imagine how much your sales team would sell if they made as few sales calls as I do?”

The question is Where Can You Make a Bigger Difference at Work?

This riff was inspired by Bloomberg’s Jerry Useem’s well thought out “The Hardest Workers Don't Do the Best Work”. Worth your time to find out why your best workers “do fewer things, and seem to have better developed mechanisms for deciding what not to do.”

https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2018-01-02/the-hardest-workers-don-t-do-the-best-work

Less Resolutions Equal More Success

New Year’s Day is the traditional start of resolutions. Like we could actually do something the morning after a New Year’s Eve celebration.

Not a fan of the annual start to your diet, saving money, and joining a gym. There is nothing magical about January 1^st. When you are ready to make a change, Start Now.

Two reasons most resolutions fail:

1. We try to do too much at once.

2. We don’t figure out why we want to change.

Warren Buffet’s method is to write down 25 professional goals, then focus on the 5 most important goals, and ignore the rest. He considers the other goals distractions from succeeding at more important goals.

My take is we can only accomplish up to 3 goals at a time. By limiting my focus to one or two goals at a time, am more likely to succeed sooner. Complete more goals in a year by focusing on fewer goals.

Most people are not focused, and lose motivation the first few times they meet resistance. The reason is they have not thought out their why.

Often make tweaks to my work routine. The reason these tweaks usually take is my motivation is to Do Meaningful Work Well. Like to be 1% better than yesterday. If this means have to drop some habits or start a new routine, so be it.

My strongest motivations are fairly simple.

Here to Serve Customers, Their Customers and My Coworkers. If it requires extra effort, okay.

My Brain Needs a Healthy Body to Carry It Around. Why you see me run pitifully on days off, and take frequent walks. Lost 10 - 15 pounds when necessary at 1 pound per month. Changes that last.

Do not to tie up every minute in a day. Free time is thinking time. This is where you can really make large leaps in innovation and productivity. Keep asking different questions when you do.

“Those who are wise won’t be busy, and those who are too busy can’t be wise.” - Lin Yutang

Have not changed my resolutions this year. My whys are a compass that guide me. What are your whys?

Holiday Expectations

Everyone has expectations for the holidays. From the simple “Santa’s coming” of the youngest to parents expecting adult children to come home to celebrate. All have expectations of the season.

A lot of these are expectations are unspoken. Worse, the other people don’t have your expectations. We are on a path for conflict.

Times change. Parents retire and their gifts shrink. Family members have health issues. Children become adults, date, get married, and have children of their own. They may have moved to work. Now they can’t all be together for the holiday itself.

Often families get together and act the way we did when growing up. Your relationships with siblings and parents fall back into habits, good or bad. Were you the rebellious child? The goody two shoes? The attention seeker? Second parent to a younger sibling? Until significant events happen, the family dynamic often doesn’t recognize the changes in your life. You have grown up!

What to do when this happens? Be nice.

They don’t mean to harm you. It may feel personal, but it is not. There is nothing wrong with sitting around with comfort food and old movies. It is okay to hear old stories again, because that is what you will tell your children about their grandparents, uncles and aunts. Everyone wants to know where they came from.

Things don’t go as planned. My wife and I were to vacation together. She got a last minute job interview in the middle of it. Changing flights 3 days before hand would cost $650 in the last few days before Christmas. Not worth it to either of us for what would become a long weekend for her.  Maybe she will enjoy the break from living with me. I will still enjoy warm weather.

Preparations were thrown astray this year. Last minute dental work and recovery time for me meant not putting up lights and decorations, not to mention shopping. This blog was not written on schedule last week, but done on vacation. After a long day helping my nephew rehab my sister’s trailer. It’s life.

Someone says the wrong thing. Your favorite comfort food is missing. Someone drinks too much eggnog. Decorations are missing. A loved one is not with you this year. It’s not only okay to miss it/them, it’s normal. Keep calm and carry on. What you and everyone needs are space, grace and patience.

Wishing everyone very happy holidays, rambunctious children, family and friends to celebrate the good things in life with. Blessings all.

Emergency Vacation Home Maintenance Car Replacement Budget

Life is not simple. Things go wrong and at the wrong time. This year replaced a car, paid for vacations, paid for 2018 trip to Alaska, replaced powder room vanity, and now have to have a crown plus a wisdom tooth extracted. 3 out of 5 were unexpected, and a 4^th was not planned for this year. Did not have to sweat how going to pay for these. Paid cash. Covered by several years’ savings.

~59% of Americans do not have $500-$1,000 to cover an emergency (Bankrate). They would have to put on a credit card or borrow from family/friends. Very uncomfortable position. Been there. How did I get free from those worries?

Any savings is better than none. Start small. Can you spend $5 - $20 less per week? What are you paying for you don’t need? What can you sell you don’t need anymore? Use the freed up income to start.

Spending less than you earn reduces your stress. Stash the cash separate from your spending money so not tempted to spend it. Windfalls go here too. The act of having to transfer the money discourages blowing it.

Put the surplus in a separate account once you have enough. Have a credit union savings account in addition to bank checking & savings accounts. This is where my fund goes separate from monthly expenses. If you are just starting out recommend you get a credit union checking and savings accounts. Put basic expenses plus entertainment spending in checking. Then deposit surplus into savings.

I use one account for Vacations, Christmas Shopping, Emergencies, Home Maintenance and Car Replacement. Not a strict budget. This year creating a HSA account for medical, but the same savings account covers any excess bills.

My budget is rule of thumb based. When my car payment was over, the same amount transferred into savings. Covers car replacement and repairs on older car. If was still paying for car, use to budget $100 per month. Clothes wear out or have to be replaced. Use my monthly average for last year’s spending. Gifts are number you buy for times people buying for. (Not an extravagant giver) Home ownership requires maintenance, so my parents budgeted an extra mortgage payment to cover improvements & repairs. This is my minimum goal for year divided by # paychecks. Simple, but works.

Most of us get a raise every year. My raises get split between increasing 401k contributions, increasing savings, charity donations, and covering increasing costs. If you move it before you see it, you won’t miss spending it.

Took me years to get ahead. Don’t be afraid to start today. Peace of mind is worth it.