Dance With The Elephant

The Necessity of TRUST to be a Great Leader in the Workplace - 8 Key Things to Do

 

DANCE WITH THE ELEPHANT: LIFE'S COSMIC EQUATION

"Because Your Life Is Worth It!"

 

FROM FORBES - HERE IS AN ARTICLE ON BUILDING TRUST

"You Can't Be a Great Leader Without Trust. Here's How You Build It."

This article is by David Horsager, author of The Trust Edge: How Top Leaders Gain Faster Results, Deeper Relationships, and a Stronger Bottom Line. 

Among all the attributes of the greatest leaders of our time, one stands above the rest: They are all highly trusted. You can have a compelling vision, rock-solid strategy, excellent communication skills, innovative insight, and a skilled team, but if people don’t trust you, you will never get the results you want. Leaders who inspire trust garner better output, morale, retention, innovation, loyalty, and revenue, while mistrust fosters skepticism, frustration, low productivity, lost sales, and turnover. Trust affects a leader’s impact and the company’s bottom line more than any other single thing.

One of the biggest mistakes a leader can make is to assume that others trust him simply by virtue of his title. Trust is not a benefit that comes packaged with the nameplate on your door. It must be earned, and it takes time. As a leader, you are trusted only to the degree that people believe in your ability, consistency, integrity, and commitment to deliver. The good news is that you can earn trust over time, by building and maintaining eight key strengths:

• Clarity: People trust the clear and mistrust or distrust the ambiguous. Be clear about your mission, purpose, expectations, and daily activities. When a leader is clear about expectations, she will likely get what she wants. When we are clear about priorities on a daily basis, we become productive and effective.

• Compassion: People put faith in those who care beyond themselves. Think beyond yourself, and never underestimate the power of sincerely caring about another person. People are often skeptical about whether someone really has their best interests in mind. “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you” is not just an old saying. It is a bottom-line truth. Follow it, and you will build trust.

• Character: People notice those who do what is right ahead of what is easy. Leaders who have built this pillar consistently do what needs to be done when it needs to be done, whether they feet like doing it or not. It is the work of life to do what is right rather than what is easy.

• Contribution: Few things build trust quicker than actual results. At the end of the day, people need to see outcomes. You can have compassion and character, but without the results you promised, people won’t trust you. Be a contributor who delivers real results.

• Competency: People have confidence in those who stay fresh, relevant, and capable. The humble and teachable person keeps learning new ways of doing things and stays current on ideas and trends. According to one study, the key competency of a successful new MBA is not a specific skill but rather the ability to learn amid chaos. Arrogance and a “been there done that” attitude prevent you from growing, and they compromise others’ confidence in you. There is always more to learn, so make a habit of reading, learning, and listening to fresh information.

• Connection: People want to follow, buy from, and be around friends—and having friends is all about building connections. Trust is all about relationships, and relationships are best built by establishing genuine connection. Ask questions, listen, and above all, show gratitude—it’s the primary trait of truly talented connectors. Grateful people are not entitled, they do not complain, and they do not gossip. Develop the trait of gratitude, and you will be a magnet.

• Commitment: People believe in those who stand through adversity. People trusted General Patton, Martin Luther King, Jr., Mohandas Gandhi, Jesus, and George Washington because they saw commitment and sacrifice for the greater good. Commitment builds trust.

• Consistency: In every area of life, it’s the little things—done consistently—that make the big difference. If I am overweight, it is because I have eaten too many calories over time, not because I ate too much yesterday. It is the same in business. The little things done consistently make for a higher level of trust and better results. The great leaders consistently do the small but most important things first. They make that call and write that thank you note. Do the little things, consistently.

Trust can’t be built overnight. It requires time, effort, diligence, and character. Inspiring trust is not slick or easy to fake. Trust is like a forest. It takes a long time to grow and can burn down with a just touch of carelessness. But if you focus on these eight components with every action, you will foster trusted relationships—whether with employees, customers, suppliers, or fellow leaders—that will drive results and the bottom line.

 

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Do You Love Your Job?

 

DANCE WITH THE ELEPHANT: LIFE'S COSMIC EQUATION

"Because Your Life Is Worth It!"

Theme: LOVE

 

 

Why You Need To Love Your Job More

Kerry Hannon, Contributor

What’s love got to do with your job? Apparently, quite a bit.

I just read the new book, Love 2.0: How Supreme Emotion Affects Everything We Feel, Think, Do and Become by Barbara L Fredrickson, a pioneer scientist in positive psychology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and Fredrickson’s message really resonated with me.

I was especially intrigued by the parts on how positive emotions and love can help your career by “drawing you out of your cocoon of self-absorption to attune to others.”

I often blog about finding ways to love your job. Some of the favorite articles I’ve written for Next Avenue and Forbes have been ones about second-acters who’ve done just that — pursuing their passions to, say, film a feature movie or open a red sauce joint.

The Falloff in Job Satisfaction

Sadly, though, older employees have experienced the steepest drop in job satisfaction over the past 25 years, according to the Conference Board research group. In 1987, more than 70% of workers 65 or older and nearly 60% of workers 55 through 64 felt good about their jobs; by 2011, their satisfaction numbers had fallen to 46%.

That said, I know plenty of people who’ve found ways to fall in love with their work again, even if they’ve been toiling for decades. They typically either have autonomy and flexibility in their jobs or are learning new things and meeting new people.

But Fredrickson has found that you can also find inner joy in the workplace through simple, practical minute-long exercises. Her bottom line: Find new ways to design your job around love.

I gave Fredrickson a call to find out more. Highlights of our talk:

Let’s start with the key question: What is love? 

Fredrickson: Love is an emotion, a momentary state that arises to infuse your mind and body alike. Love is sharing one or more positive emotions with another person, a reflection that you are invested in each other’s well being.

What do you mean when you say, “Redesign your job around love?”

Fredrickson: Listening and supporting your co-workers can renew your energy, give you confidence and build resources to face tough problems. Feelings of connections and camaraderie spark resilience and a more positive work climate.

Create games at work and find other ways to open up and connect. In our office, we started a weekly card game at lunch. It’s made a huge difference.

Are there ways we can use love to understand our colleagues better and improve our work relationships? 

Fredrickson: Eye contact, it turns out, is crucial. New scientific evidence suggests that if you don’t make direct eye contact with a co-worker, you’re at a distinct disadvantage in trying to figure out what she really feels or means.

Accessing this emotion makes you wiser. You become more accurate, more attuned and less gullible. You intuitively grasp her intentions. It informs your next move.

If you work virtually and can’t see your colleagues face to face, pick up the phone and speak with them. Much emotional information is carried by shared voice, as well.

What’s the root of unhappiness in the workplace?

Fredrickson: All too often the problem is people don’t take the time to truly connect with each other. Feeling pressured to accomplish more each day, you multitask just to stay afloat.

Every moment finds you plotting your next move, what’s next on your never-ending to-do list.

Increasingly, you converse with others through emails, texts, tweets and other ways that don’t require speaking, let alone seeing one another.

Love requires you to be physically and emotionally present. It also requires that you slow down.

Maybe all you need to do is stop by someone’s office to talk about something that’s not work-related.

What are examples of micro-moment exercises we can do to make our work life more joyful? 

Fredrickson: One of the most powerful ones is doing a day review at the end of your workday. Spend a minute thinking about your three longest interactions. Ask yourself how connected, how attuned, how close you feel to the people you were interacting with.

You’ll get a subtle cue reminding you that each of your social interactions is an opportunity for something more than just an exchange of goods or information. When you learn to cultivate these each day, it’s easier to let negativity roll by.

You also think people should reframe what you call their “self-talk.” What do you mean?

Fredrickson: Nearly everyone has some form of inner self-talk. Maybe you worry too much, second-guessing your every move, expecting the worst at every turn.

How many times each day do you saddle yourself with needless negativity?

Self-acceptance is the foundation for positivity. Lightening up on ourselves allows us to get more joy out of what we do.

Ask yourself: “What is going right for me? What can I be thankful for?”

We can spend all our time focusing on what’s going wrong; problems grab our attention and pull us down that route. But we can also say, “OK, the problems are here, but what’s going well?”

When people ask themselves that, it can be a powerful way to change their inner chatter to let them feel more open, more alive and more likely to connect with others.

You also think employees should try to get joy from the success of their work colleagues. 

***TO READ ANOTHER ARTICLE ON FREDRICKSON CLICK HERE!***

 

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NYTimes Article - New Love: A Short Shelf Life

DANCE WITH THE ELEPHANT: LIFE'S COSMIC EQUATION

Because Your Life Is Worth It!

Theme: LOVE

***This article is from the New York Times about how we as humans change over time when in relationships.  The results are quite interesting!  Read on!*** 

 

IN fairy tales, marriages last happily ever after. Science, however, tells us that wedded bliss has but a limited shelf life.

American and European researchers tracked 1,761 people who got married and stayed married over the course of 15 years. The findings were clear: newlyweds enjoy a big happiness boost that lasts, on average, for just two years. Then the special joy wears off and they are back where they started, at least in terms of happiness. The findings, from a 2003 study, have been confirmed by several recent studies.

The good news for the holiday season when families gather in various configurations is that if couples get past that two-year slump and hang on — for another couple of decades — they may well recover the excitement of the honeymoon period 18 to 20 years later, when children are gone. Then, in the freedom of the so-called empty nest, partners are left to discover one another — and often their early bliss — once again.

When love is new, we have the rare capacity to experience great happiness while being stuck in traffic or getting our teeth cleaned. We are in the throes of what researchers call passionate love, a state of intense longing, desire and attraction. In time, this love generally morphs into companionate love, a less impassioned blend of deep affection and connection. The reason is that human beings are, as more than a hundred studies show, prone to hedonic adaptation, a measurable and innate capacity to become habituated or inured to most life changes.

With all due respect to poets and pop radio songwriters, new love seems nearly as vulnerable to hedonic adaptation as a new job, a new home, a new coat and other novel sources of pleasure and well-being. (Though the thrill of a new material acquisition generally fades faster.)

Hedonic adaptation is most likely when positive experiences are involved. It’s cruel but true: We’re inclined — psychologically and physiologically — to take positive experiences for granted. We move into a beautiful loft. Marry a wonderful partner. Earn our way to the top of our profession. How thrilling! For a time. Then, as if propelled by autonomic forces, our expectations change, multiply or expand and, as they do, we begin to take the new, improved circumstances for granted.

Sexual passion and arousal are particularly prone to hedonic adaptation. Laboratory studies in places as far-flung as Melbourne, Australia, and Stony Brook, N.Y., are persuasive: both men and women are less aroused after they have repeatedly viewed the same erotic pictures or engaged in similar sexual fantasies. Familiarity may or may not breed contempt; but research suggests that it breeds indifference. Or, as Raymond Chandler wrote: “The first kiss is magic. The second is intimate. The third is routine.”

There are evolutionary, physiological and practical reasons passionate love is unlikely to endure for long. If we obsessed, endlessly, about our partners and had sex with them multiple times a day — every day — we would not be very productive at work or attentive to our children, our friends or our health. (To quote a line from the 2004 film “Before Sunset,” about two former lovers who chance to meet again after a decade, if passion did not fade, “we would end up doing nothing at all with our lives.” ) Indeed, the condition of being in love has a lot in common with the state of addiction and narcissism; if unabated, it will eventually exact a toll.

WHY, then, is the natural shift from passionate to companionate love often such a letdown? Because, although we may not realize it, we are biologically hard-wired to crave variety. Variety and novelty affect the brain in much the same way that drugs do — that is, they trigger activity that involves the neurotransmitter dopamine, as do pharmacological highs.

Evolutionary biologists believe that sexual variety is adaptive, and that it evolved to prevent incest and inbreeding in ancestral environments. The idea is that when our spouse becomes as familiar to us as a sibling — when we’ve become family — we cease to be sexually attracted to each other.

It doesn’t take a scientist to observe that because the sex in a long-term committed monogamous relationship involves the same partner day after day after day, no one who is truly human (or mammalian) can maintain the same level of lust and ardor that he or she experienced when that love was uncharted and new.

We may love our partners deeply, idolize them, and even be willing to die for them, but these feelings rarely translate into long-term passion. And studies show that in long-term relationships, women are more likely than men to lose interest in sex, and to lose it sooner. Why? Because women’s idea of passionate sex depends far more centrally on novelty than does men’s.

When married couples reach the two-year mark, many mistake the natural shift from passionate love to companionate love for incompatibility and unhappiness. For many, the possibility that things might be different — more exciting, more satisfying — with someone else proves difficult to resist. Injecting variety and surprise into even the most stable, seasoned relationship is a good hedge against such temptation. Key parties — remember “The Ice Storm”? — aren’t necessarily what the doctor ordered; simpler changes in routine, departures from the expected, go a long way.

In a classic experiment conducted by Arthur Aron and his colleagues, researchers gave upper-middle-class middle-aged couples a list of activities that both parties agreed were “pleasant” (like creative cooking, visiting friends or seeing a movie) or “exciting” (skiing, dancing or attending concerts) but that they had enjoyed only infrequently. Researchers instructed each couple to select one of these activities each week and spend 90 minutes doing it together. At the end of 10 weeks, the couples who engaged in the “exciting” activities reported greater satisfaction in their marriage than those who engaged in “pleasant” or enjoyable activities together.

Although variety and surprise seem similar, they are in fact quite distinct. It’s easy to vary a sequence of events — like choosing a restaurant for a weekly date night — without offering a lot of surprise. In the beginning, relationships are endlessly surprising: Does he like to cook? What is his family like? What embarrasses or delights him? As we come to know our partners better and better, they surprise us less.

Surprise is a potent force. When something novel occurs, we tend to pay attention, to appreciate the experience or circumstance, and to remember it. We are less likely to take our marriage for granted when it continues to deliver strong emotional reactions in us. Also, uncertainty sometimes enhances the pleasure of positive events. For example, a series of studies at the University of Virginia and at Harvard showed that people experienced longer bursts of happiness when they were at the receiving end of an unexpected act of kindness and remained uncertain about where and why it had originated.

Such reactions may have neuroscientific origins. In one experiment, scientists offered drinks to thirsty subjects; those who were not told what kind of drink they would get (i.e., water or a more appealing beverage) showed more activity in the portion of the brain that registers positive emotions. Surprise is apparently more satisfying than stability.

The realization that your marriage no longer supplies the charge it formerly did is then an invitation: eschew predictability in favor of discovery, novelty and opportunities for unpredictable pleasure. “A relationship,” Woody Allen proclaimed in his film “Annie Hall,” “is like a shark. It has to constantly move forward or it dies.” A marriage is likely to change shape multiple times over the course of its lifetime; it must be continually rebuilt if it is to thrive.

The good news is that taking the long view on marriage and putting in the hard work has calculable benefits. Research shows that marital happiness reaches one of its highest peaks during the period after offspring have moved out of the family home.

The nest may be empty, but it’s also full of possibility for partners to rediscover — and surprise — each other again. In other words, an empty nest offers the possibility of novelty and unpredictability. Whether this phase of belated marital joy lasts, like the initial period of connubial bliss, for longer than two years is anybody’s guess.

 

Sonja Lyubomirsky is a professor of psychology at the University of California, Riverside, and the author of the forthcoming book “The Myths of Happiness: What Should Make You Happy, but Doesn’t, What Shouldn’t Make You Happy, but Does.”

HERE IS THE LINK TO THIS ARTICLE THAT WE FOUND IT AT : http://nyti.ms/18gHPJK

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The Drama and Trauma of Life - Dance with the Elephant: Life's Cosmic Equation

 

DANCE WITH THE ELEPHANT: LIFE'S COSMIC EQUATION

Because Your Life Is Worth It!

 

THE DRAMA AND TRAUMA OF LIFE:

Call it the drama and trauma of life, the yin and yang or the pain and pleasure. The bipolar extremes of daily life are an integral part of our world and our universe as a whole. Many times the trauma, pain and negative experiences of life become the elephant or the secrets we tend to bury and disassociate from ourselves. As Don commonly says, "We stuff them in a bottle and we cork the end as tight as we can." 

Unfortunately the elephant in the room and the secrets we try to bury in a bottle have a tendency to have a hidden control over our lives. Our goal in dancing with the elephant is to uncork the bottle and to bring these secrets out into the open where they can be dealt with and recognized for what the really are. This process can unleash some of the greatest potential for growth in life and will allow us to redirect our lives toward our true destiny.

Interested in learning more about the Dance With The Elephant series? Check out these links:

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Duane shares his experience of personal loss when after being married to his wife for 12 years and having had two children together, she comes out of the closet and informs Duane that she had a new partner she wants to live the rest of her life with. Duane was totally devastated and couldn't even admit the truth of his situation to other people for over a year into the separation and divorce process. It took a total of 3 years, a lengthy rebuilding process of counseling, support groups and personal development, before Duane finally had his feet back on the ground and was on his way to living life again.

As a part of Duane's healing process, he created a list of 20 goals he wanted to accomplish. These included everything from meeting another woman that he could fall in love with, to taking a trip to Europe with someone special to him. During the next 3 years after Duane's traumatic divorce, he accomplished all 20 goals he had made, he remarried and had started a new family. In looking back, the trauma of his first marriage became the launch pad to the drama of his new life, marriage and family.

As you look back on your life today, what were the most dramatic and traumatic moments for you? 

Make a list and try to come up with at least 3 major events at both ends of the bipolar spectrum of life.

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Life is a game of Give and Take...

This is a quote by Brother David Steindl-Rast from his book, Gratefulness, the Heart of Prayer: An Approach to Life in Fullness, about Giving and Taking within your life and your life's relationships.

"Sometimes we keep going back and forth between giving and taking back, opening ourselves and clamming up, many times a day.

But life is give-and-take, not give or take. Spasmodic gasping is one thing, healthy breathing another. When we take a hearty breath, we give ourselves to the air we inhale; and when we give it out again, we take a quick break from breathing. This balance of giving and taking is a key to healthy living on every level of life. 

In fact, balance is too mechanical a word to apply to the intimate intricacy of this give-and-take. We are talking about a giving within taking and a taking within giving. Once this is spelled out, it is hardly necessary to stress the fact that we are not playing off giving against taking. By no means. We are playing off a life-giving give-and-take against a mere taking that is as deadly as a mere giving. It matters little whether you merely take a breath and stop, or give a breath and stop there."

The Great Multiplier of Time - Dance with the Elephant: Life's Cosmic Equation

 

DANCE WITH THE ELEPHANT: LIFE'S COSMIC EQUATION

Because Your Life Is Worth It!

 

 

 

Duane:
When I go deer hunting in the late Fall one of my favorite moments in what is now a 52 year tradition, is to take a moment in the middle of the night to walk out into a clearing and to gaze up into the starlit sky.  Our hunting property is in east central Minnesota, far away from the big city lights and there are clearings where you feel like you are inside a gigantic planetarium.  Sometimes I'll lay down on the ground and gaze into the midnight sky and I'll have a warm feeling of connection deep in my belly.  I know that it was out of the life cycle of stars being born and stars dying that all the elements of the chemistry periodic table where created.  

All the chemicals and compounds that make up you and me were created in the belly of a star that at some time during the past 13.7 billion years exploded and released these elements into space that they could be used by other star systems and continually advance to heavier and heavier elements.  The stars also represent the source of energy that created life itself.  And I believe that source of energy exists within each of us that gives us unique meaning and purpose in the universe.  

But it's all tied and connected to this phenomenon we call time.  More appropriately called space time.  For when I look up in the sky its as bright and as full of stars as it will every be, because those stars are actually moving away from us and speeds that exceed the speed of light itself.  This means that my great, great grandchildren, if they still have the opportunity to deer hunt on our family hunting property, will not see the same sky I did.  They will be viewing the sky at a different moment in space time and all of the stars in the sky that I saw will have moved to a new relative position that may or may not be in view of my future lineage.  

The challenging piece of this that is most important in understanding Life's Cosmic Equation is that time itself has purpose.  And during the time you have in the cosmos, you too have a purpose to fulfill in the universe.  The stars that you see are actually doing work and are doing what they were meant to do for the universe.  They're creating new elements that will be used by other solar systems to create new planets.  They have a unique reason for being at this very moment in time... right now!  And you have a similar reason for being right now that you need to act upon.  Your personal mandate is to take immediate action based on your CP, RC and F, to fulfill your purpose and destiny in the universe.  So do you understand the significance of time, this very moment, in your life today?

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How Much Time Do I Have? - Dance With The Elephant : Life's Cosmic Equation

 

DANCE WITH THE ELEPHANT: LIFE'S COSMIC EQUATION

Because Your Life Is Worth It!

 

 

HOW MUCH TIME DO I HAVE?

Back in 1970 there was a western comedy film made called "Little Big Man". Jack Crabb, played by Dustin Hoffman, is being raised by the Cheyenne indians. The good hearted tribal leader Old Lodge Skins each day wakes in the morning and states to all who will listen, "Today is a good day to die!" He then makes his way up the hill to lie down on top of his burial throne. Each evening, he would eventually come down from his burial throne realizing that today was not to be his day to die.

Duane and Don present an exercise in this video called the 9 by 21. Here's the scenario for participating. Imagine, effective this very moment, that you have exactly 21 days to live. Now during this 21 days you can do any 9 things you choose regardless of type or cost. The only requirement is that what ever you choose to do, you have to allow enough time for the activity to start and end. If you want to take a trip to Europe, you have to allocate enough time to get there, time to visit the sites you want to see and time to return for your death and funeral, in what ever location that's going to be. 

It's very important for you to take this exercise very seriously. Remember that all of you loose ends in life need to be tied up during the next 21 days. You need to make the tough choices and prioritize what, who and where you want to be during these final days.

When Don did the exercise he immediately recalled a wonderful experience he had with his son where they traveled across the country combining music concerts with golf. He recalled the trip as probably the best he's ever had with his son. But the reality of the moment was, he had never done a similar excursion with his daughter. So Don quickly formulated a trip that would take he and his daughter to the ocean for surfing and each day would end with dinner at the best local seafood restaurant. Okay, there's 3 days done, 18 to go.

Duane recalls his journey through the exercise that included a number of moments where he cried like a baby. Just weeks before doing the 9 by 21, Duane had severed ties with his oldest son based on what he called a tough love situation. So now, with only 21 days left to live, how could he mend his relationship with his Son in time for his death? It was a very scary moment for Duane and it really made him painfully aware of what truly is most important in life. 

So what nine things would you choose to spend your time doing over the next 21 days? Could this list become a set of goals for the coming year? Can you honestly say, "Today is a good day to die?"

 

 

***Here is an excerpt from Brother David Steindl-Rast and his book, Gratefulness, The Heart of Prayer: An Approach to Life in Fullness.  We thought that this excerpt was fitting with the theme of how much time one has in this world.***

"We have experienced moments of gratefulness, and, therefore, we knew from within the attitude we want to repeat and maintain. Those moments of deep gratefulness are, in fact, our moments of true prayerfulness, moments in which our heart is wide awake. We have already explored this and have come to recognize that prayer and thanks spring from the same root, from the heart. It is to those peak experiences of the heart that we must go back if we want to learn to live gratefully.

...What does it mean to go back to an experience? There are two ways of going back. One makes us draw new strength from the past; the other makes us shrivel up. What makes the difference? Let's put it this way. If I recall a past experience in order to clutch it and suck the last drop of sweetness from it greedily, it will yield nothing but disappointment. If, on the other hand, I recall the same experience merely to celebrate it, once again, it will nourish me again and again. This is how I suggest that we recall the moments in which our heart was wakefully alive. 

All we know about "life in fullness" flows from memories of that kind."

 

Not interested in an exercise? How about a touching story as told by Don Calhoun and the loss of his Brother Bob. Find the story here: http://www.digelog.typepad.com/how_to...

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Having Faith - Dance With The Elephant : Life's Cosmic Equation

 

DANCE WITH THE ELEPHANT : LIFE'S COSMIC EQUATION

Because your life is worth it!

 

HAVING FAITH:

Faith allows you to cope with the constant unknown part of daily life. No one knows what tomorrow will bring, yet through faith, we can survive and even thrive in the uncertainty. You can be fully connected to your passionate creative purpose and your reason for existing, but it is faith that bridges the who you are today, with the uncertain destiny of what you will become tomorrow.

Your capacity for personal faith (Me) has its origin in both in your genetics and cultural upbringing. Modern day science estimates that 50% of who you are is based on your genetics. The DNA passed on to you by your parents and the 400,000 years of human generations before them, make up half of the composition of your personality. It's what you've got to work with and there's nothing you can do about it.

Now it's the other 50% that is a bit more interesting in the fact that it is totally predicated by the environment we grow up in and the choices we personally make within those surroundings. Since birth most of us have lived with parents, siblings and relatives who had certain traditions, values and norms. This group of people you live with are located in a geographical location that has a dominant culture, religion and societal framework. All these pieces of the puzzle play a role in forming your personality, character and temperament. To exist with in a social system, one must conform to the norms and values of that system. The level of faith you have in yourself today was determined by the genetics of your birth and the human interactions that followed ever since.

Faith is a place of mystery, where we find the courage to believe in what we cannot see and the strength to let go of our fear of uncertainty... Get Deliberate; Get Inspired; Get Going!

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Why Is It That We Do The Things We Do? - Dance With The Elephant : Life's Cosmic Equation

 

DANCE WITH THE ELEPHANT : LIFE'S COSMIC EQUATION

Because your life is worth it!

 

 

 

WHY DO WE DO WHAT WE DO?

How can I be happier? Is there a formula on how to be happiness? Modern day science approximates that 50% of who you are is based on your genetics. The DNA passed on to you by your parents and the 400,000 years of human generations before them, make up half of the composition of your personality. It's what you've got to work with and there's nothing you can do about it. 

Now it's the other 50% that is a bit more interesting in the fact that it is totally predicated by the environment we grow up in and the choices we personally make within those surroundings. Since birth most of us have lived with parents, siblings and relatives who had certain traditions, values and norms. This group of people you live with are located in a geographical location that has a dominant culture, religion and societal framework. All these pieces of the puzzle play a role in forming your personality, character and temperament. To exist with in a social system, one must conform to the norms and values of that system.

Don grew up in an Irish family where the gift of story telling and the attention it would bring you was a part of daily life. In his early years of life, he interacted with the world for the sole purpose of receiving approbation and praise in return. He was always asking himself, "What do people think of me?", "Do they like me?", "Do they think I'm funny and a great person to be with?" This tendency for self-affirming feedback became an addiction for Don and eventually approached neurosis. Finally, it was when people would give him positive feedback and he didn't believe they were being genuine that Don's sole purpose in life took a deep nose dive.

Maturity and true friends helped Don move beyond his personal paradox and to begin approaching life with a new paradigm. Don realized that his perception of personal worth and value could no longer be measured by the response of the people around him. He needed to be strong enough, courageous enough and worthy enough to love himself for just being who he is. He was okay with the fact that someone might not like him and might not enjoy his colorful story telling.

Looking for ways to discover your Creative Power and key to greater happiness? http://DanceWithTheElephant.org

Researcher/Author Brene Brown has spent much of her life researching the human dynamics of shame, blame and guilt. For most of us, these three words can play a big part in our daily lives. Ironically, all three words require the receiver to agree with the blamer. In other words, if I am going to feel guilty about something I'm accused of being responsible for, I have to receptively choose to accept the guilt internally. When you learn to Dance With The Elephant, you can learn to shield yourself from these energy sucking demons and let them bounce off you like ping pong balls. You have the power of receptive choice to frame and direct your destiny in life.

TODAY'S EXERCISE:
Why do you do the things you do? Have you made receptive choices that are in concert with your creative power and your chosen destiny in life? Are you going in a direction in life where you have control of the steering wheel and you can put the pedal to the medal or hit the breaks when you need to?

Don Calhoun and Duane Kuss co-author the ground breaking book "Dance With The Elephant" filled with life-changing stories and personal exercises. 

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We Are Connected : The Multiplier of Life's Cosmic Equation - Time

 

DANCE WITH THE ELEPHANT

Because Your Life Is Worth It!

THE GREAT MULTIPLIER - TIME

Discovering the secret to a happy life.

Life's Cosmic Equation:

(Creative Power (CP) + Receptive Choice (RC) + Faith (F)) * Time (T) = Cosmic Legacy (CL) 

The Story: 
Duane:
When I go deer hunting in the late Fall one of my favorite moments in what is now a 52 year tradition, is to take a moment in the middle of the night to walk out into a clearing and to gaze up into the starlit sky.  Our hunting property is in east central Minnesota, far away from the big city lights and there are clearings where you feel like you are inside a gigantic planetarium.  Sometimes I'll lay down on the ground and gaze into the midnight sky and I'll have a warm feeling of connection deep in my belly.  I know that it was out of the life cycle of stars being born and stars dying that all the elements of the chemistry periodic table where created.  

All the chemicals and compounds that make up you and me were created in the belly of a star that at some time during the past 13.7 billion years exploded and released these elements into space that they could be used by other star systems and continually advance to heavier and heavier elements.  The stars also represent the source of energy that created life itself.  And I believe that source of energy exists within each of us that gives us unique meaning and purpose in the universe.  

But it's all tied and connected to this phenomenon we call time.  More appropriately called space time.  For when I look up in the sky its as bright and as full of stars as it will every be, because those stars are actually moving away from us and speeds that exceed the speed of light itself.  This means that my great, great grandchildren, if they still have the opportunity to deer hunt on our family hunting property, will not see the same sky I did.  They will be viewing the sky at a different moment in space time and all of the stars in the sky that I saw will have moved to a new relative position that may or may not be in view of my future lineage.  

The challenging piece of this that is most important in understanding Life's Cosmic Equation is that time itself has purpose.  And during the time you have in the cosmos, you too have a purpose to fulfill in the universe.  The stars that you see are actually doing work and are doing what they were meant to do for the universe.  They're creating new elements that will be used by other solar systems to create new planets.  They have a unique reason for being at this very moment in time... right now!  And you have a similar reason for being right now that you need to act upon.  Your personal mandate is to take immediate action based on your CP, RC and F, to fulfill your purpose and destiny in the universe.  So do you understand the significance of time, this very moment, in your life today?

Here is an Exclusive story that is about the first part of Life's Cosmic Equation - Creative Power: http://bit.ly/13Vxgdg

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We Are Connected But Are We Losing It To Transference? - Dance With The Elephant : Life's Cosmic Equation

 

DANCE WITH THE ELEPHANT : LIFE'S COSMIC EQUATION

Because You Life Is Worth It!

 

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TRANSFERENCE:

In life all of us use various methods to cope with the ups and downs, the yin and yang, the good and bad we face each day. One technique we commonly use is to transfer (transference) our responsibility onto someone or something else. From an argument with your spouse, to a problem you faced at work, how often do you find yourself throwing blame and guilt onto somebody else.

As a child growing up, like all children, I faced the challenges of adapting to my surroundings.  If I remember right from my basic psychology courses some 40 years ago, I think it was Freud who talked about the development stages of oral and anal.  For me, I was frustrated in oral being one of the first modern generations where baby's could be fed baby formula.  Yes, I never got to enjoy suckling my mother's breast. (like my kids for fortunately able to do)  And when it came time to move from the oral to anal phase of life, things went from bad to even worse.  Now my battle for the bottle evolved into a struggle of control between me, my body and my mother.

It was at this time in my life that I faced the first paradox of man, being born as a conscious human being with seemingly infinite cosmic potential but existing in this biological body that had to conform to the culture of my parents and the norms of my village.  It was here that the battle lines were drawn between what and when I would eat, and where and when I would piss and crap.

For me playing with friends was the ultimate childhood right and mandate.  Whether it was Mom calling that lunch was ready, or my body saying I needed to take a dump, I would ignore and fight the interruptions with all my might.  Although there are many stories I could tell, the most dramatic centered around my bowel movements or lack there of.  I would hold it till I absolutely had to go.  And when I went, the log I pushed out would plug the toilet.  I'd watch and pray it would go down, but time after time it would plug the toilet and the water would run up and over the toilet bowl onto the bathroom floor.  The real malady here is that the issue of anal control never resolved itself until the invention of super flush toilets at Junior High.  It was only when I could rely on the log of crap going down the toilet that I finally got into a regular schedule of taking a crap when the natural urge came.

Erich Fromm wondered why most people did not become insane in the face of the existential contradiction between a symbolic self, that seems to give man infinite worth in a timeless scheme of things, and a body that is worth about 98 cents.

I use this story to introduce a topic of great importance in this book.  One that bears the power of personal discovery like no other.  The process is called "transference" and it is something we do at every stage and level of life experience.  When I eventually realized that life was much easier in the long run if I ran home for lunch when Mom called and conformed to our family ritual of noon lunch together, I essentially relinquished my personal power of creative moments with my friends to the cultural norms of my family.  I transferred my way of looking at the world over to that of my mother and father.


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