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Archive for the ‘Life balance’ Category

Wilma Mankiller died of pancreatic cancer today at age 64. She is the first woman to lead the Cherokee Nation as its principal chief and instantly became an icon of women’s history. I interviewed her for Hard Won Wisdom and was so moved by her insight and kindness. She was one strong woman, and I want to share some of her hard won wisdom with you.

On how she was raised: “Nobody in my family ever told us that there were things we couldn’t do because we were female, or things we couldn’t do because we were poor, or things we couldn’t do because we were Native American. When I hear such admonitions from other parents, it makes me grateful for how I was raised. We didn’t feel there were limits on what we could do.”

On attitude: “The single most important lesson I learned by watching people in my community was that it is important to have a good attitude and keep your mind free of negative thoughts. That’s what I observed. I saw people facing the most daunting sense of personal or financial problems, yet they always found something positive in their situation. That had a profound impact on the way I looked at the world. And, it impacted the way I look at other people. They looked at the positive, rather than the negative. That’s important. When you meet people, you can focus on the positive attributes rather than the negative ones. It’s your choice.”

On her health obstacles: Throughout her life, she faced unbelievable adversity, surviving a terrible car accident that forced her to undergo dozens of operations, a neuromuscular disease and a kidney transplant. Of her adversities, she said, “The biggest challenge in my life has been to try to continue with my life and my work while dealing with an unbelievable array of health issues. I’ve dealt with that the same way I dealt with the opposition I had because I was a woman. It’s a problem, I acknowledge it and I try to deal with it the best way I know how, and then move on. Just like I don’t let my energy be siphoned off into questions of whether women should be in leadership, I won’t let my energy be siphoned off by a question of health. I can control my mind when I don’t control my body. I can do what I can to keep myself well and continue on. It’s really a choice. You can dwell on hard or bad things if you want. You don’t have to.”

On her triumph as a woman running for chief: “We live in a relatively conservative area in eastern Oklahoma and I expected my politics to be the issue. I’d been involved in many things that would be considered liberal or even radical. I thought those would be the issue.They weren’t.

“The issue was my being a woman, and I wouldn’t have it.

“I simply told myself that it was a foolish issue, and I wouldn’t argue with a fool. I ignored it and focused on the real issues.When it would come up and someone would say,‘You’re a woman, how will that affect your leadership,’ I said ‘Thanks for asking, now lets talk about health care.’“I did have my tires slashed.And one time when I was marching in a parade, a fellow folded his hand into the shape of a gun and did a pretend shooting of me as I walked on the parade route.That somehow bothered me more than anything. There were other things, like people burning down my signs on the billboards, but it was that man that I remember most. I could have dwelled on the hateful things people were saying to me, but I’d have lost the election.”

This is the latest in a series on dealing with control issues.

There are bosses who try to micromanage everything in order to control the outcome, and what do they accomplish? They alienate their people, get no buy-in or support, and ultimately scramble to achieve their goals.

How does it feel when someone is trying to control you? Not good. I kind of like my free will, and I’m pretty sure you like it, too. I don’t like someone telling me when or where or how or why. I like to feel that others respect and value my judgment enough to let me do my best – whether the issue is professional or personal. I welcome constructive criticism because others can see places where I can improve my game. But I don’t welcome the hovering presence of a control freak who is so neurotic that he or she can’t let me be my best self.

You can probably imagine that I am inclined to fight back when that happens. But I am floored by the legions of people who find themselves in jobs, relationships, friendships and other situations where they get pushed around. There is certainly no shortage of controlling partners who will pick away until they have wiped out the confidence and self-direction of a less-assertive partner. If you find yourself being pushed around by someone who acts like he or she knows better than you, you’ve got to take responsibility for giving your power away. You are the one allowing it and you’ve got to ask yourself why. Do you need someone to tell you how to do things their way or do you need to find someone who respects you enough to let you do it yourself?

I know a woman whose husband controls everything, from how she styles her hair to when (and how) they are going to be intimate. She is always telling me, “I feel so out of control,” and she is – because she lets herself be bullied and lets someone else dominate her world. Sometimes you have to take chances – at the risk of a relationship – in order to salvage your individual self. You have to honor who you are, or you are no one at all.

How do you do that? By setting boundaries and making choices. I have had more than one bullying boss, and I learned to deal with them in different ways. One guy was normally loveable, but he had a terrible temper that would blow before he got all the information he needed. This was back when I was a reporter and he blew up at me in the middle of the newsroom, yelling because he thought I didn’t do an assignment, but I’d done it –he just looked for it in the wrong computer file.

 “Don’t ever yell at me in public like that again,” I told him as I pulled him into his office. “It is unprofessional and I am not going to take it. Second, I did the assignment. It’s right where it is supposed to be. You have made a big scene out there based on your bad information and now you need to go out there and publicly set the record straight.” And, he did. He apologized right in front of everyone.

But, another bullying boss would blow up at everybody and, when he blew up at me, there was no setting him straight. That was the way he was. He didn’t care about being fair or decent. He didn’t care about how we felt about how we were treated. He walked around the room with his “I’m the boss!” attitude and, believe me, he was the boss. At least, until I decided that he wasn’t.

It is amazing how much power an individual can have over you until you decide you have had enough and take the steps to make change. In this case, I had enough, did my resume and got another job. Once I moved on, he couldn’t control another single thing in my life.

When others have control over you, it is because you relinquish it to them. You are not a prison inmate who has relinquished your right to live and breathe in the way that you choose. But, you do have the decision to stay in controlling relationships and controlling work environments – or not.

You can fire your boss. You can dump a bullying spouse or partner.  It may not seem like you are in charge of your own life, but you are.

This is the first in a series of posts on dealing with control issues.

I always say, “Make a plan for what you want to do with your life. It’s the greatest piece of fiction you will ever write.”

Truly. Life unfolds. You cannot force, command, direct, ordain, bully, manage or control it. You just can’t. As soon as you think you have everything all figured out, you slam right into an obstacle. There goes the plan.

If we could control life, we’d all have millions in the bank, excellent health, gorgeous spouses or partners, perfectly behaved children, fully functional families and, well, you get what I mean. Life would be oh-so-pretty on every given day. It would be predictable and it would be fair.

It would also be boring.

There is so much in life that is out of our control, yet we feel some urge to manage the unmanageable to achieve the outcome we want. We want people to think, react and behave  the way we want them to. We want our efforts to be successful. We want to know where we are headed, but sometimes we just can’t.

You could be on the greatest run of your career, only to find out that you have cancer. You get it together, adjust your plan of what is ahead and gear up to do what you have to do to beat the disease. But, sometimes it isn’t up to you. Sometimes, life comes at you in ways that are brutal and unfair. It’s all part of the growth experience.

You can’t control what happens to you, but you can control your reaction. Look at how many people have been shocked to learn their spouses have been cheating or living secret lives. And how many people have devoted their lives to companies that were quick to dismiss them when times got tough. Look how many people thought they had secure retirements, only to see their investments disappear.

Life is fragile and unpredictable. It turns on a dime. One day you are healthy, the next day you are not. One day you are happily married, the next day you are not. One day you are gainfully employed, the next day you are not. We are constantly faced with an uncertainty that is so unsettling to some that, rather than learning to ride the waves, they try in vain to control the tide.

Life can’t be controlled.

Work. Life. Balance. Work. Life. Balance. We’ve all heard those words so much it’s as if they have merged together into a simple little mantra which, if repeated enough we will manifest. “Work. Life. Balance.” “Work. Life. Balance.” “Work. Life. Balance.”

Poof!

Look at her! See that career woman climb that company ladder! Look how happy her marriage is! My, aren’t her children beatuiful, successful and happy! She still has time to cook gourmet recipes, clean house and have great sex! Not only that, she still plays tennis, too!

It doesn’t work like that.

Years ago, when I was still married and working as a newspaper reporter, I was drowning in an investigative project that stretched for ten brutal months. It was the most challenging and important work I’d ever done, but as that series became more consuming, I kept moving the mail and my junk to the guest bedroom where it amassed itself into a giant pile of unresolved clutter. One evening, friends gathered at our home before we all went out to dinner. Imagine my horror when my then-husband opened the door to the guest bedroom and said, “Look at this!”  before exposing my secret mess.

In the midst of some of my greatest accomplishments as a journalist, I was exposed for the one failing that trumped everything. I’d failed in my traditional role of wife. I don’t think it was his intent to land that kind of blow on me, but I felt that, if I wasn’t a good housekeeper, I was not worthy. I was humiliated and I was crushed.

 Of course, if you come by my house today, you will see that my office doesn’t look much better than the guest room did on that particular occasion. I’ve grown into my identity and balanced myself out by making decisions that let me define success and failure, rather than tradition or guilt. That is how you achieve life balance. You do it consciously and on your own terms.

Know your priorities and know where they rank. Years after that experience, I’ve got my priorities down. God, family, friends, community, recreation, work, and, if there is time, housekeeping and other details. Whatever. You’ve got to drop the ball somewhere, and I choose where mine drops. That is the first step in balancing your soul.

 I get so amused by the importance people give to the notion of work life balance. Like, once we get it right, we all let out a nice, long Zen Ohm and all will be well. Balance implies some sort of time/effort equity that few ever achieve in life. I certainly don’t, and I don’t even have a husband or children to worry about.

A woman once told me she needed help juggling all the balls she’s got in the air and I said, “let some of the balls drop.” 

I remember former cable television senior executive Gayle Greer showing me how she learned how to balance her soul. As  a working, single parent,  she traveled about 80 percent of the time when her son was growing up. He seldom came along. One day, he asked if he could schedule time for her to meet with a couple of coaches who wanted to talk to her about college scholarship possibilities for him. “It blew me away,” she said. “College? I hadn’t even thought about it. I wasn’t living in the present. I was so intensely holding on to whatever it was, keeping all the balls up in the air. Then it dawned on me, this kid is leaving.” That changed her forever. She never missed one of her son’s football games after that.

Our lives move so quickly that it seems like we are powerless over our schedules. But, we’re not. Truly, if you schedule a day off in your calendar, it doesn’t exist. And you may think you are too important or too busy or too stretched, but you have got to make time so you don’t lose your “self. “ If you think you can’t, or you can’t do it right now, you are wrong. Because, if someone you loved were suddenly in a life or death situation, your current schedule would screech to a halt and you would know what really matters.

 Balance is about identity. It’s knowing who you are and what matters most so that you honor your priorities in the way you want and need to honor them. We sacrifice so much of ourselves to things that don’t matter.

The mantra isn’t “Work life balance.” It’s, “I know what matters and I honor that truth.”

My mother has had Alzheimer’s Disease for eight years. At least. She is 83 and living in a nursing home, fed through a stomach tube.

A few weeks ago, she was sleeping when I arrived for a visit. I nudged her awake, then climbed into bed to cuddle with her as I have done on every visit since she moved there. It is the closest human contact she has, since my father’s bad back won’t let him get in bed with her. I have cherished those moments because of the way it makes her smile and how her eyes twinkle, and because I feel her love radiate life from my sweet, lost mother.

On this occasion,  I didn’t see the usual joy. I saw fear.

My mother didn’t know who I was. She was afraid — there was a stranger in her bed and she was powerless to protect herself. She tried to say something, but her words came out as jibberish. I showed her pictures of us when I was a child, but she didn’t make the connection like she’d done on the other occasions when she couldn’t quite get who I was. So, I climbed out of the bed.

Then, I dropped my shorts and mooned her. I have always been the joker in the family, and this made Mom laugh harder than I have heard her laugh in years. That bare bottom could only belong to her daughter. “You are beautiful,” she said. A full sentence. She finally knew it was me.

I think she recognized me the other day. I am dogsitting for a tiny little Chihuahua mix, and since Coco is so darned portable compared to  my two big dogs, I brought her to visit my mom. Mom’s left side has been paralyzed since a major stroke 17 years ago. The Alzheimer’s has frozen most of the rest of her body, so she does not move much. So, I put the little dog on the bed. She didn’t say anything and she didn’t smile. Coco wagged her tail and kissed my mother, but there was still no real reaction.

A Florida afternoon thunderstorm started brewing, and with the first rumblings from the sky, tiny Coco started quivering in fear — trembling, all over. I tried to calm her, but she kept shaking. Mom watched this, transfixed. “It’s okay,” I told Coco.

After a long moment, Mom moved her right hand. Slow and unsteady, she moved it closer and closer to Coco and finally rested it on the little dog’s side. She kept it there, holding her, trying to comfort her.

Coco didn’t stop shaking until the thunder stopped. But, she didn’t move away from my mother to be closer to me. I will never forget the innocence of that tiny dog, or the slow awakening of my fading mother.

When there are no words, there is touch, which says more anyhow.

Coco meets my parents. Sorry about the quality. Blame my cell phone.

I spent last week on the legendary cycling adventure, the Bicycle Ride Across Georgia. I can’t tell you how much fun I had — but, I can show you.  The good was that I had seven days of hard cycling. The bad was eight nights of sleeping in a tent. That may have been easy in my early 30s, but in my 40s? I was ready for my bed about halfway through it. Anyhow, enjoy these photos. And, if you cycle, check out this great trip!

One of the most vibrant women I know is sitting in a remote airport on the other side of the country, waiting for her flight back to sanity. This is a turning point in a two-year relationship with a great guy who has a very, very dark side.

Her boyrfriend can be entertaining and warm and all good things a handsome boyfriend can be. I’ve had so much fun with him.

But there is that dark side. He wasn’t physically violent with her — but the violence was emotional. His need for control mandated he isolate her from others and extinguish her free spirit. It required that she be at his side every day, all day — even if he would not speak a single word to her for weeks at a time. He resented her desire to have time with her friends. He resented her going anywhere without him — even if it was only for a few minutes or hours.

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I have to be careful writing this because they may work things out. I just want her to be happy — and whole. Many of us have stayed in relationships for too long, clinging to what’s good instead of opening our eyes to the reality that what is bad is really bad, and it won’t change.

I want to write about this because I am constantly running across people who linger in destructive relationships because they don’t have the courage to do what my friend is doing. But, what could be worse than sacrificing your “self”?

I am so proud of her for having the courage to leave today, because he started showing remorse and today was supposed to be the day they left on a fabulous, expense-paid trip to Hawaii. She’s been on the road with him for several weeks, and much of that time has been lost to his silent-treatment. Even if Hawaii were honeymoon perfect, she would know what always simmers deep inside of him. Despite his urging to give it another shot, she still had a faint flicker of “self” burning within her and she knew that she had to come home now, before he extinguished everything inside of her.

I know her pain. So do her friends. She is so beloved that her “pod” includes six of the most incredible women I know –some of the best friends I have. The minute she put out the call that she was in pain, they rallied like I have never seen friends rally. Two will make the long drive to pick her up at the airport tonight — at 1 a.m. All of us will converge at her home this weekend for a party and bonfire where we will celebrate her spirit and fuly bring her back into the light of who she is. I am quite certain that the support and love she will get from her friends will outshine any trip to Hawaii.

We only want what is best for her. If that relationship is what will make her happy, so be it. But no one should be forced to sacrifice one bit of soul for another. If you relate to this at all, remember the lesson. If someone expects you to sacrifice your “self” for love, it ain’t love.

Fawn Germer is the best-selling author of five books and one of the nation’s most sought-after leadership speakers.

Bertie and I have been friends for 19 years, so her visit to my home in Florida was something I was quite excited about. Then again…

See, Bertie is 15 years older than I am, and through her, I get a glimpse of what is ahead for me. I suffered through her hot flashes when she was perimenopausal. But that taught me what my perimenopausal years would be like.

Imagine my horror yesterday day as we prepared to leave for the beach.

“Would you like to use the bathroom before we go?” I asked.

“No,” she said matter-of-factly. “I sneezed in the car on the way here and peed in my pants.” It was spoken as she’s made this public proclamation before.

She wants me to note here that she did change her clothes, and I am grateful for that.

The 19 years we have known each other have passed in a flash. In just another flash, I’ll be 15 years older. Her age.

Then again, I don’t fear the future because I may grow up to be like Bertie.

She is younger now than when she was years ago. Wiser. More sure of herself. Her relationship with her husband is 30 years solid now and she is blossoming with him and with herself in the first year of her early retirement. She has so many dimensions now.

We have traveled many, many miles together. I watch Bertie and I am not afraid of what is yet to come.

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As long as I don’t sneeze.

I have never understood the workaholic mindset, and now that I have slid into it, I am even more bewildered.

I haven’t lived this life since I was a 23-year-old, fresh-out-of-college newspaper reporter working an 80-hour week on a series. One night, a friend stopped by the newsroom to pick something up.

“Why am I still here?” I asked.

“Because your life is meaningless and this is all you have,” she laughed.

Days later, when I turned in my timecard, Joyce Duarte, the assistant to the managing editor, took one look at the hours I’d worked and asked, “Gosh, Fawn. Is it worth it?”

I knew it wasn’t. That was the last time I drove myself that hard. If I worked overtime, I took comp time instead of cash. Always. Time was worth more than money.

Imagine my surprise when I went to bed last night and realized that I am right where I was all those years ago. I am working too long and too hard. I have a purpose! I have a new book coming out! We are setting up multiple websites as part of a new marketing strategy! I am learning the insanity of Web 2.0 and I am trying (and failing) to keep up with e-mail! Isn’t that exciting?

No! For those of you who come to my website looking for the daily dose of optimism, hang with me. It is coming.

It is coming because I am having an awakening.

If you are working so hard that you aren’t living a full and meaningful life, you are not living. It doesn’t matter what you do to drive your success — you are not successfully living because work is not enough. It isn’t. It’s a challenging part of your life, but it is not your life. Not if you are getting the deluxe tour.

I only get to live once. You only get to live once.

I don’t know about you, but I am going for a very long bike ride. What are you going to do to live right now?

Fawn Germer is the best-selling author of four books. Her fifth book, Finding the UP in the Downturn, will be released in April. She travels internationally as a keynote speaker who works with organizations and companies that want more courageous and creative performance.