This morning I spent a half hour or so in an increasingly familiar activity–talking to a help desk in India about a technology issue.  My help professional, Victor, “took over” my computer and commented on my desktop wallpaper–a stock photo of three 60ish aged women in bathing suits and the wonderful old poofy flowered bathing caps.  When Victor asked about the women, I said I was writing a book about 60 year old women.  He commented on their wise faces, and their beauty.  As he did his work, he asked about the flowers on their heads, having never seen such bathing caps.  I laughed and told him that at one time, these bathing caps were considered both feminine and fashionable.  Then he asked what the book was about.  I said that I was interested in change and its meaning at that time of life.  He asked why I was interested in women this age.  I said I was one.  I suggested that when one’s hard charging days are over or at least somewhat less intense, and one has more time (perhaps) to devote to personal change, it might look different from change at 25 or 40.  Victor worked on the settings on my computer.  A few minutes later he said, “In India, when a married couple reaches the age of 60 they have a celebration with children, grandchildren, friends and the community.  It is essentially another marriage ceremony and signifies the entry into an important new age.”

I love thinking about this.  As Victor told me more about the old traditions around this ceremony, and how contemporary Indians celebrate it, I thought about marking change in some public, official way in my own culture.  I also thought about the recognition that this stage of life is important and significant to Indians, not, as in this country, a time to slink quietly off to the golf course or knitting class.  The changes I have embarked on are, at least in part, because I want to continue to contribute to my community and my world, but in a more focused and meaningful way than I have been able to do with the pressures of active parenting and earning a living.

Victor told me at the end of our call that I had inspired him.  The feeling was mutual.  I so appreciated his reaching out and connecting with me on a personal level.  Even though I couldn’t see him, or he me, I felt we each had made a friend.  Victor’s story of his traditions added significantly to my understanding of what change could be after 60.

As I am now working on a new book project and using not one but two different coaches for the project, I’m particularly aware of the power of questions. It doesn’t really matter what your specific goals are in relation to these questions. the answers can be applied to your experiments and practices leading to success. Some questions that have been helpful to me are…

• What are you doing in your life that you truly enjoy? It helps me to keep a journal. I know that some of you think that sounds much more like an obligation than fun. A scrap of of paper will do. Jot down three things you enjoy

• What percentage of your time is devoted to the activities you truly enjoy? How much time you get to do the things you enjoy? My son in law is a beautiful golfer. He didn’t play at all when his son was a baby. Now he plays most Saturdays. Given a job that takes most of the other six days of the week, this is how he stays sane.

• Since we all have obligations, and these obligations aren’t necessarily among the things you’d describe as truly enjoyable, how do you engage with those obligations to include colleagues you like, activities you’re good at, or time that you can limit so that you DO have time for the things you enjoy? Now jot down two or three obligations. How could you either make them more fun, or limit them?

• Where is your list of your own talents and skills? Make a list of ten (at least) talents and skills. Keep this someplace where you can look at it, and look at it when the world doesn’t value your talents as much as it should.

• For what or whom are you grateful (your cat, your relationship with friends, your boss, your children, a long run, a project carefully completed)? Make a list of ten things (at least) that you are  grateful for.  I am grateful for my friends and family, the view from my deck of San Francisco Bay, the pool in which I swim three times a week, my students.  Keep this list someplace where you can see it (next to your list of talents and skills?) so that when you are feeling particularly wronged or ungrateful you can remind yourself that there is much that is right in the world.

Happy list making!

I spent the last two days with a bunch of really smart people in Seattle (Redmond actually) working with the joint processes of Appreciative Coaching and Asset-Based Thinking. As a follow up to a brief discussion about the Simultaneity Principle in Appreciative Inquiry and Appreciative Coaching (inquiry and change happen in the same moment), participant Jon Pincus suggested that there might be three elements to the principle rather than two . The third element might be asset creation or enhancement.

Thinking electronically about this, I find that we may have created at least three new assets over the two days our group was together. I’ll try to define these several assets.

One is community. When folks get together around an idea they are passionate about, they can bind with a kind of glue that is hard to create when the convening principle is rank, or location, or even mutual need. We were together because we believe that change can happen more effectively and enthusiastically when we think about ourselves and our world in terms of possibilities and commonalities rather than problems and deficits. We also believe that teaching, coaching, and enabling this worldview has the potential to let loose an avalanche of pent up energy in people all over the world.

Another asset we created was the seed of a business. This business may reside in one company, three or twenty, but spreads the word in sales, schools, business and individual coaching about how our energy can by magnified to include many more people in the asset-based worldview.

The last asset I think of in this moment is love. When I think of this group, what now holds us together is more than respect, more than admiration for our good brains, more than hope, or gratitude–although all of these are present. For me, what now binds us is the asset of love.

Governor (of New York) Eliot Spitzer has come down off of his self-righteous high horse this week. I guess it is more truthful to say that he has been knocked witless off of the horse. Don’t get me wrong. I have appreciated his knight in shining armor persona, and, as someone who worked peripherally on Wall Street for seven years, have cheered his every toppling of abusive and greedy investment executives and companies. Lest we all forget that we are human, however, it is best for all of us, including Governor Spitzer, to remember that too much holier than thou speechifying is not becoming to the species. We all have feet of clay.

Then there is the wife of Eliot Spitzer, the beautiful, brilliant (by all accounts), and accomplished Silda Wall Spitzer. She has out-earned him, and perhaps in her own way even out-accomplished him. Women in the press are wondering aloud or at least a-print why she, looking as haggard and shocked as the rest of us, would submit to his public confession, would “stand by her man” as Hilary and others have done before her. Isn’t it time for women to end the perception that it is OK for their husbands, partners, or intimate buddies to do really stupid stuff and they’ll just smile wanly and keep the family together?

And what in heaven’s name could I have up my sleeve about coaching in all this? It is this: coaching begins where we are. In this case, Eliot Spitzer is at a horrible crossroads in his career. Perhaps he is at the end of his political career. Let’s say for the sake of imagining that Governor (perhaps by the time you read this, ex-Governor) Spitzer comes to you for coaching. What do you discover together in your first session? Surely you would notice the vast crusading he has done against many kinds of corporate greed, and the successes he has had, at least in part due to his single-minded focus and perhaps outsized ego. Ego works for good as well as evil. Then you would notice his evident pain. What will he do with this pain of shame and horror at having been discovered doing monumentally stupid stuff, and at having done it, of course? Would you be able to empathize rather than to judge?

And then suppose that Silda Spitzer came to you. What would you discover with her? Would you recognize the resources she has to bring to this unique situation? Would you affirm that her skills as a lawyer, mother, and scholar can be applied in this time of perhaps unequaled rage and hurt? Would you acknowledge the rage and hurt and by doing this help her to stay with these uncomfortable feelings so that she can make good decisions about what’s best for her, and then for her family?

It is way too easy to posture over sex scandals such as this one. Eliot Spitzer has made a career out of just such posturing. When we discover that he did not meet his own standards of behavior (and none of us do all of the time), and that he put at least three other people (his wife and three daughters) in jeopardy because he ignored or flaunted his own standards, we can posture or we can look inward at the ways in which we have not met our own standards. Coaching as managers, parents, teachers, and counselors requires this inward look so that we might effectively aid the wrongdoer, in this case Eliot Spitzer, to acknowledge his acts, be responsible and accountable for them to others, forgive himself, and rebuild his life. We might also then empathize with the victim, Silda Spitzer in this case, and help her to find a reasonable way to separate herself from the carnage without necessarily losing or leaving those she loves.

Dear coaches and folks interested in positive processes,

I’ve begun another book, and it is about happiness and well-being. The chapter I’m currently working on seems to need some stories and so I offer you the opportunity, and ask for your help in creating stories of a time when you knew you were especially happy. The length of the story might be anywhere from a paragraph to a page, your choice. If you are interested, please post your stories below as response to this blog entry. No pressure. Do this only if it makes you happy! I will credit you in the book if I use the story, or use a pseudonym if you prefer.

Here are some thought starters:

Describe a time when you knew you were especially happy…

What was going on (describe the scene as best you can)…

Who was involved (were you alone or with someone else)…

Has this scene or occasion of happiness ever been repeated (is this something you do regularly, or more than once, like mountain climbing or your work)…

What are the elements of the time you are describing that particularly contribute to your happiness (family, achievement, new sox)…

Thanks for your willingness to read this, and perhaps to play.

What does time management have to do with positive processes? Well, I can tell you that I, for one, feel a lot more positively about my life when I’m not stepping over piles in my office and when my bills are paid on time. I have found David Allen’s book Getting Things Done particulary helpful in seeing the big picture of organizing my time and my stuff. He writes that there are five stages of mastering workflow.

• 1. Collect things that command your attention
  • a. Capture in containers (folders, notes on your planner, email alerts, voicemail reminders)
  • b. Use as few as you can get away with
  • c. Empty them frequently
• 2. Process what they mean and what to do with them
  • a. What is actionable
  • b. If not actionable, trash, delegate, keep as reference
  • c. What is the next action
  • • i. Do it
  • • ii. Delegate it
  • • iii. Defer it
• 3. Organize the results
  • a. Calendars, list of projects
  • b. Reminders of next steps
  • c. Reminders of things you’re waiting for
• 4. Review as options for what we choose to do
  • a. Weekly review
• 5. DO
  • a. Criteria by which to decide what to do
  • • i. Context- what you can do in the moment
  • • ii. Time available
  • • iii. Energy available
  • • iv. Priority

Hope these are helpful in your work, your studies and your life. Allen’s book, available in paperback, is well worth your valuable time.

Yikes this is a hard one.  Forgiveness should be, perhaps must be, included in the positive processes that lead to happiness.  I have colleagues who have written about and struggled with forgiveness in personal relationships as well as in fields such as spiritual direction and restorative justice.  For me, this word is almost repulsive.  (I know I’ve just told you more about me than about the word.)  The aversion to the word is a part of my own turning away from the difficulty of forgiveness.  At some times in my life, I seem to have been more willing to carry a burden of anger or self-pity than to explore the positive possibilities of forgiveness.  At a minimum, forgiveness means a “cessation of hostility, [and] the forswearing of revenge,” according to Boston University’s Charles Griswold, author of Forgiveness: A Philosophical Exploration.  At best, forgiveness has the potential to change the person who did the injuring, as well as the person injured.  Asking for forgiveness requires that the person who injured commits to not injuring again, making the act more than an apology.  Forgiving implies that the person injured believes at least in the honest intention of the person who injured that she will not injure again, making the acceptance more than a momentary reconciliation.

What are your thoughts on this?