Motivational Leadership Speaker, Bestselling Oprah Author

These are out-of-control times, and that’s unsettling to people who like to feel they have control. I was especially touched by a woman in my audience this week who asked for my advice, and this is for her. And you.

A lot of people feel a real need for control, but life is essentially an out-of-control experience. What I’ve learned is: The things you can control give you power over the things you can’t.

You can’t control events or other people, you can’t control the economy or the outcome of a game or the weather. You can do everything possible to take care of your health, but still get sick. You can have all the talent in the world and work harder and stronger and faster than everyone around you, but still lose your job. You can be the best spouse in the world, and still get left.

Life presents you with endless opportunities for heartache, loss and anger, and your initial reaction will probably be a natural, knee-jerk emotion that is both honest and justified. But you always have the power to step out of a situation and make the calculated decision to take power over your emotions. That option is always, always, always there, no matter how badly you feel.

At some point, you have to move beyond the emotions that amplify victimization or self-blame. You may have made bad decisions, you may have made mistakes, acted too quickly or not quickly enough, you may have chosen the wrong friends or lovers or spouses, you may have taken shortcuts with your children, you may have been to selfish or too selfless – you can analyze and overanalyze any situation ad nausea. You can count and recount all of your regrets, live and relive your guilt, and cry rivers over your disappointment.

It’s not easy to let go of victimization because, on some level, you get something out of it. Sometimes, you get sympathy, sometimes you get grief, sometimes you get disparagement, sometimes you get something else which either fuels your self-loathing or gives you an excuse not to take responsibility for where you are or take action to make things better. Sometimes your victimization will get you  a lot of attention, but that doesn’t do much to help you heal.

That doesn’t mean you deny your truth. You can acknowledge, analyze and share what has happened, and probably should. That’s all part of conscious healing. But, there comes a point when you have to make a choice to take your power or be consumed by your lack of it. You can stay frozen in your despair or you can deal with it and move on.

More tomorrow.

When I was 29, I went to a therapist

And told her

I felt old.

I turned 50 today,

under the towers of Zion

where I cycled and hiked and laughed until

the day ended in darkness

under the watch of a million desert stars.

Sometimes, I am officially irrelevant,

A middle-aged woman,

Invisible.

Yes!

Don’t tell, but I sneaked into the pool of a five-star resort

Just put my beach bag on a real nice lounger and when I put on my sunscreen,

A server brought me a glass of champagne,

Because she thought I belonged there…

Free champagne, I am so free.

I can wear whatever bathing suit and show off all kinds of cellulite because,

At this point,

No one is looking to criticize

The middle-aged woman.

Let the world ignore me while I ignore the expectations

Every day,

I will look up to God and

kiss warm light.

I choose not to dream,

But to live.

“What do you think of China?”

That’s a hard question to answer, especially when the person asking it is the executive vice-president of a $4 billion retail chain, and when that person is clearly Chinese. But, Wilson Zhu, executive vice president of Michaels, wanted my impressions.

I muttered something — certainly not the truth, because I didn’t want to insult him.

He pushed again. “No, what do you really think of China?”

“Well,” I began nervously, “China scares the hell out of me. I think of the Chinese as a bunch of men in black suits who have bought up our treasury bonds, are getting control over foreign oil that we need, and have destroyed the competitiveness of American industry by putting children on assembly lines. Then there are the environmental issues and…” I was not subtle, and he was not surprised. He’d heard it all before.

“Have you been to China?” he asked. So began a connection that would take me with a team of Michaels executives on a speaking tour of Asia. While there, I was able to interview business leaders, entrepreneurs and the next generation of talent. I was also given tours of some of the factories that do business with Michaels.
I knew that I would see what was presented to me, and that I’d never see the first child on an assembly line (most retailers have huge compliance teams that do spot checks). Still, I had my fears:

1. They would try to feed me dog.
2. Someone would be following me.
3. My communication would be monitored.
4. The bathrooms would be terrible.

I do not know if there are secret crews of men in black suits who are coming to take over America. I didn’t see any. I don’t have answers for the many points of judgment that start in America and stand as a wall between us. And I certainly have no comprehension of the power of the Chinese government and no explanation of its intentions.

What I have are encounters with people who share the same kinds of hopes and dreams that I have. I’m working hard for a living, they are working hard for a living. I love my family, they love their family. I am a product of my culture, they are a product of theirs.

Nobody fed me dog, nobody was following me, I had no signs that my communication was monitored and I only found one bathroom that was horrid, which is a better track record than I get over here in the U.S. Also, the Chinese government did not break into my hotel room and implant a microchip in my brain to reprogram my thoughts and make me spout off propaganda on popular U.S. blogsites. I don’t think.

But, when you come back from China and say good things about the Chinese people, there are a lot of people who think you’ve been suckered. After giving a positive travel report to Tracie Cone, a friend who was a reporter alongside me at The Miami Herald years ago, she blurted, “You’ve been tricked!” Then laughed.

I wrote a simple column this week about a remark made by a young businessman I met who talked of how the Chinese people don’t like to boast of their successes because a constant fear of failure pushes them to excellence. I noted how different that is from how we approach self-talk here in the U.S. We relish in our successes and know that if we expect big things, we’ll achieve them. All I did in that column was ponder the contrasting approach.

When that piece ran on the front of the business page of The Huffington Post, I posted it on Facebook. One of my Facebook “friends,” shot back a really ugly diatribe about how “this Chinese culture” is responsible for low quality products, child labor, pollution and human rights atrocities. “Let’s not be so quick to hold the Chinese ‘humble’ culture in such high esteem. Fawn, I respect your opinions, but it sickens me to see all of your ‘clones’ immediately fall into lock step with your every utterance.”

I don’t get it. I went to China and I met a nice guy who had an interesting perspective, but I’m not supposed to write about it because of everything else we think about China? What is it about China that is so damning that every single Chinese person is contaminated by every single negative?  All I did was write about a person and his opinion on success and motivation.

My Facebook critic has never been there, yet apparently he knows everything there is to know about China. I know China’s got some very ugly stains, and so do we. But I also know that there is a real human element there that we have not even tried to understand.

Where are the men in black suits? Maybe they are in our heads, symbols of our own fear. We can fear them, or work with them. This world has globalized, and opportunity exists for those who realize it.

I’m sure my critic thinks I’m naive, and I’m sure there are millions of others who would agree. I don’t know why such simple thoughts about people are so threatening, but apparently they are.

China is neither all good nor all bad. It’s I see China as a country with four times our population and ten times our problems. They’re working on their issues.

I asked Wilson about it and he said, “People think they look at the world objectively as it is. In reality, they look at it as they are.”

So true.

What a moment.

I traveled to Shanghai, Beijing, Taipei, Shenzhen and Hong Kong to speak on leadership and begin interviewing Chinese business pioneers for a book on globalization.

Here’s a little of what happened:

Last week, I returned from a speaking tour of Asia where American bravado met Chinese humility.

I am a leadership and motivation speaker who tells people to expect success, make decisions with confidence and to advertise their strengths and wins. That is the exact opposite of the Chinese way, which is to be humble and sense that failure looms.

I just got an e-mail from my new friend, Elmer Cheng, who is senior manager of product development for Polygroup — the company that manufactures most of the artificial Christmas trees and backyard swimming pools in the U.S. He is the 24-year-old son of Paul Cheng, the patriarch and founder of the company.

When I was in Hong Kong, I interviewed the family for a book I am writing about leadership, globalization and the Chinese way. I woke up to an e-mail today where Elmer gave me something significant to ponder.

“We do not know how to handle praise very well,” he wrote of the Chinese people. “We are always unsure how to respond and it is almost borderline embarrassing. Of course, praise is always welcome but in practical terms, some Chinese may see it as useless, because receiving it does not teach you how to improve or maintain success. Receiving criticism on the other hand, gives you a path of what needs to be done. What drives us is the fear of failure and not a moment of praise. Success is always temporary, failure lasts much much longer.”

That is the exact opposite of what American business leaders are coached to do. While it seems a little dark, this Chinese concept interests me because, for them, it seems like it is an equally effective model for success. They obviously are doing something that works. Last year, Polygroup was recognized as Walmart’s supplier of the year for the fifth time.

I don’t imagine I’d get much business as a motivational speaker speaker on leadership if I stood in front of major corporations telling people to hunker down and fear failure. While some of the American business leaders I know don’t brag on themselves, few will underrate or abbreviate what they have done.

When I interviewed many business people in China and Taiwan, almost all minimized their achievements. When I would ask them to summarize their successes, I got a lot of silence and stares — not because they didn’t know, not because their achievements were classified information, but because that simple, ice-breaking question caused real discomfort for them. I’d been told that the Chinese people were humble, but I never expected that humility to be so pronounced.

Would they be more successful if they stopped fearing failure and started pounding on their chests saying, “I’m successful! I’m wonderful! And, doggone it, people like me!” I don’t know. The Law of Attraction, which says our thoughts create our reality, has spawned a self-help industry in the U.S. where people have tapped into the their inner guru to remind themselves that anything is possible if they expect success. Elmer Cheng showed me that much is possible by respecting failure and shutting up about the victories.

I told him I am going to post an article about his thoughts on the Huffington Post, one of America’s top ten websites. His response? “You can use my quote but can I remain anonymous?” I told him it is important for me to use his name so readers will know I didn’t make anything up. Reluctantly, he agreed.

Humble.

I gave a motivational speech yesterday for a group of men and women who have been unemployed for awhile. A long while. Most of them have been out of work for more than a year and many are closing in on two years without a paycheck.

At least 90 percent were over 40 and, probably 75 percent were over 50.

I found myself looking at a group of people that had largely lost hope. One woman came up to me and said, “I know I won’t be able to get a job selling because of my age. I have to find some way to re-invent myself.” Maybe re-invention will be good for her, but I was stunned by the hopelessness in her tone. It’s not as if she were 100 years old. She was 52. Fifty-two and thinking life was over! She looked dispirited and worn out, and I just wanted to hold her and promise her that everything would turn around soon.

But, how?

The weight on that sweet woman’s shoulders was so heavy, and I know that the difficulties foisted on her by this horrid recession had zapped her of her confidence and verve.

I’m so big on the Law of Attraction that I know that what she puts out is exactly what she’s going to get back. If she — and the others in her group — projects frustration and hopelessness, life will give them plenty of reasons to be frustrated and hopeless.

But if they tell themselves  that the turnaround has begun, their luck is increasing daily and that they are in-demand, employable and worthy, guess what? They will project that they are all of those things. And once they put that energy out there, things truly will turn around.

Some people think this is a simplistic and Pollyanna approach to life, but the truth is, life is a lot simpler than we sometimes make it. We have to stop trying to force things and simply do the things that bring luck, success and good energy our way. Can the people I spoke to force change overnight? No. But they can change their mindset, re-focus their actions, work hard and expect big things. Sooner or later, something will work.

My first thought when I woke up this morning was, “Mom is going to die soon. Maybe this week.”

Two weeks ago, I believed that Mom’s condition had been so severely compromised that she was suffering. A friend shared a similar experience with her own mother’s battle with Alzheimer’s. Because she had a living will, they were able to discontinue her tube feeding and her mother passed in peace. I thought my mother deserved that peace, as well. I asked my father to consider doing the same thing. A meeting was called with four representatives of Hospice and four people from the nursing home that has given my mother such loving care for four years. They explained that we have powerful options.

That was the most sobering hour I have ever spent. The decision was my fathers, and he spent days agonizing over it. We went to the home today to make our wishes known, but I wanted to talk to Mom first. That’s when my mother blew me away.

We walked in her room and she looked right at us. She tracked our movements with her eyes. I knew it was her. Mom. My mom. My beautiful, one-of-a-kind mother. One hundred percent, she was right there with us.

I sat on her bed with her and leaned close. “Mom,” I said firmly, “It is very important that, if you understand me, you let me know.”

The look she gave me said everything, but I wanted confirmation. “Blink” if you understand me, I said. She blinked. Then I wondered if she just blinked because she needed to blink. So I said, “Blink several times.” And then she blinked several times. But, I still didn’t want to be imagining anything.

“Betty,” my dad said. “We want to do what you want us to do for you.” I won’t share everything here because I want to respect his privacy, but he made it clear that he wanted to honor her wishes. She looked straight at him, very serious.

“Do you want to live like this?” he asked.

She looked at me, then looked at him. She smiled at him. She smiled at me.

I asked the same question. Again, she looked at Daddy and smiled. Then, at me. Another smile. Dad leaned in and she moved her head up a little. He inched toward her, and she kissed him. I leaned in closer. She kissed me.

“Are we reading you right?” I asked. “You want to keep living like this?”

She smiled again. At me, then at Dad.

We probably asked five more times,  just to be sure, but we were sure. She was sure. We told her we’ll ask again if we think she is in pain. She gave a knowing look. We’re in it together.

It proved something I said many years ago.

You don’t bet against Betty Germer.

My cousin, the indomitable Faye Ellen Himelhoch Valencia, died this morning at age 48. She is exactly nine months younger than I am, and we grew up together.

We both played the flute, but she was the better flutist. We went to Hebrew class together, but she was way better at Hebrew. We worked on the Sunday school newspaper together, but I wound up being the journalist. We both were raised to be strong women, but she exhibited a strength that leaves me in awe.

Faye had so much courage as she battled the Multiple Sclerosis that first appeared when she was 36. She spent her last several years in a nursing home near her family in Michigan. When I saw her last summer, she had the softest, most perfect skin, and she radiated warmth and love. She was always model beautiful and had a heart that told all of us what it meant to mix true beauty with true grit. She was strong beyond description.

Last week, things spun out of control — at first there was an infection, then a seizure, then heart problems, and now this. I know she is alive again, and new. Her sister Gail told me that she knows Faye is “Flying around up there, finally free of that body.”

My heart hurts. I am thinking of my Aunt Sandy, who has coped with so much grief — losing my larger-than-life  Uncle Bob and her own mother so close together. She visited Faye every day. I can’t imagine how hard it was for her to watch her daughter suffer so, but Aunt Sandy was there. My heart goes to my cousins, Alan and Gail. And to their spouses and children. Their family is in pain, which means all of the families connected to the Himelhoch clan are in pain.

My sadness is especially real for Faye’s two daughters, Alex and Monica, who had to cope with more than any young girls should ever have to face. Now young women, they are their mother’s legacy. She would want them to live rich and vibrant lives, filled with adventure and hope. I wish for them a much easier road than their sweet mother traveled. More than that, I wish them her courage, stamina and determination.

Hours before she died, she took a final look at her beautiful granddaughter and her girls.

What a heroic woman. God bless you, Faye Ellen. I love you and miss you.