The Black Eye

One of the most important things to remember about a black eye is that at some time or another we are all going to get them and eventually the visual and/or emotional impact of a black eye is going to go away. Ideally, what ever circumstances and resulting visual or emotional impact resulting from what lead to the black eye and the associated damage, will long be remembered and have a positive impact on our lives and the direction we are headed. Black eyes are a tough way to learn lessons but they are better than not learning at all. The sudden and forceful event that resulted in a black eye is memorably shocking and that is good!

Life has a funny way of getting our attention and through some "black-eye" event remind us and teaches us what we need to learn in order to get better. The "black-eye" moments are those moments that dramatically get our attention and scream for immediate action. We must do something right now because of the damage and perhaps that is true. But what is more important is that we immediately accept that the damage done will highlight something that we should improve on. The changes necessary to prevent these "black-eye" circumstances from reoccurring can be positive steps to learning how to and how not to.

There is no victory in allowing "black-eye" events to change your goals. Move on by accepting the reality that the event did occur, there is visual or emotional damage and proceed toward a change in your life that will result in positive outcomes. The victory is found in your response and how willing you are to accept that a mistake was made, you put yourself in a challenging position and got walloped because of that decision and you are going to change so that you never allow that to happen again.

Being in the wrong place at the wrong time in a racquetball court while playing doubles. 
I do not play doubles any longer. Lesson learned. 

Really?

Really? "Really", is a popular refrain these days regarding a disbelief of a statement or action or absence of action. When someone has the opportunity and the potential to accomplish something and choses not to do so because they are lazy, feel free to look them in the eye and say; "Really?"

The fundamental problem with lack of progress most often resides more in omission than commission. When you are doing something, there is a possibility that you will make mistakes. Feel free. When someone decides, consciously, to not do something, they may feel secure that they are avoiding mistakes, but they are wrong. Once you know what to do you must do it. Make mistakes, lots of them, but reduce the number of times you make the same mistake. Learn by doing.

Lazy I don't get. Taking a break, I get. Taking a day off, I get, Taking your well earned vacation, I get. But lazy I don't get and simply cannot tolerate lazy. The best course of action is to take action. People will follow you if you demonstrate confidence, even if you are headed in the wrong direction.

History is rife with stories of very talented and capable individuals who did absolutely nothing. History is also rife with less talented and less capable individuals who accomplished amazing things by taking action. They weren't lazy, they did not make excuses and they did not accept the status quo.

Fortunately for the successful people in the world, we have lazy people as examples of what not to do. Being lazy is a really bad decision but at least it is a decision. Being lazy is a good example of a bad example. So, if you are going to be a lazy person be a really good lazy person so all of the "doers" in your world can see, by your inactivity, what not to do.

For all of you people that are not lazy, always change the roll.

Back to Basics

My former boss, a newspaper sports writer in his previous life,  used to tell me all of the time: "If it ain't blockin' and tacklin', we probably don't need to spend much time on it." Football requires that teams effectively employ the basics of blocking and tackling in order to put their team in a position to win. So does business.

Often businesses and people, after they reach a certain level of success, feel a compelling need to change what they did that made them successful in the first place. They were once passionately engaged in doing the basic actions required to succeed in their chosen endeavor and somehow, not doing those things began to make sense. The change in doing the successful basic actions probably did not occur overnight. Failure nor success rarely happens quickly. Instead, the players became complacent doing the day to day actions that resulted in measurable progress and felt that they could surely make things happen more quickly if they would fundamentally change what they had been doing successfully. When this calculated change occurs and things don't work out it is typically the process that is faulted and not the people. After all, they reason that it was the same people involved now as when they were making progress. So if could not be the people, it must be the process. Disillusioned to say the least.

The things that helped to make you successful are they very same things that will ensure a greater level of success, if you get better at those things. Let your competition travel down the road of unproven processes hoping to make light-speed process. There is a reason that the basics are called basics. The basics are the fundamental building blocks to every successful foundation. When you hear companies, large and small, talk about "getting back to the basics" consider just how much they have allowed their foundation to erode  by deliberately walking away from the fundamentals of "blocking and tackling. The negative results are self inflicted wounds that are 100% preventable.

Consider those actions that are basic to the success in your professional and personal life and commit to getting better at those things. Do change, but not for the sake of change. Change by getting better at the basics, not back to basics.