- Know yourself—what you want and what you don’t want. Having clear goals can help save you from being caught up in the moment and disregarding what it is you really want and need.
- Have good boundaries—they’re how you should take care of your needs. Identify what’s healthy and what crosses that line.
- Appreciate your value, and expect respect. Faults become thick when respect wears away. Assess concord in how you both approach openness, sincerity, and conflict resolution.
- Get out there and meet a wide range of people. Be persistent in your search for the right relationship. Give people a fair chance. No one can be perfect. So, think about how you’ll work around their imperfections.
- Don’t put people in a box, especially when there isn’t actually a box that characterizes who they are. Let yourself and the other person be who you each are. Don’t deny their individuality; be open to being surprised.
Relationships
Let Go of Toxic Friendships
Friendships are an integral ingredient of happiness, and they often help you feel better—but not always. Some friendships are just bad for you.
Occasionally, you can fall into the trap of hanging onto unhealthy relationships because they’re familiar—even when you’re constantly let down. Worse yet, ‘ambivalent relationships’ can cause you more anxiety than being with people you actively dislike.
It takes two to define a friendship. Relationships are grounded in social exchange, and with unbalanced friendships, the other draws more from the “friendship bank” over time than they care to put into it. If you’ve set clear expectations and boundaries, and the other isn’t consistently sticking to them, perhaps it’s time to re-evaluate your relationship.
What you get out of your friendships ultimately affects your physical and emotional health. It pays to focus your attention on strengthening healthy relationships and letting go of toxic friendships.
Luckily, most friendships are not too difficult to escape. Downgrade the friendship. Make yourself less accessible. If the relationship isn’t very close, merely drift apart.
Change Your Perspective, Change Your Reactions
From the eighth-century Buddhist philosopher Śāntideva’s Bodhicaryavatara (“Entrance to the Path of Awakening,”) a translation from Stephen Batchelor’s A Guide to the Bodhisattva’s Way of Life (1979:)
Where would I possibly find enough leather
With which to cover the surface of the earth?
But just leather on the soles of my shoes
Is equivalent to covering the earth with it
Likewise it is not possible for me
To restrain the external course of things
But should I restrain this mind of mine
What would be the need to restrain all else?
A powerful reminder that you can’t magically make the whole world and its people run smooth and easy, but you can reorient your heart and mind to change your perspective and endure the bumps that you’ll encounter.
Idea for Impact: If something isn’t to your liking, change your liking or find something else of your liking. The willingness to adjust is perhaps the single most critical human faculty.
Get Rid of Relationship Clutter
Don’t hold on to relationships that aren’t supportive or beautiful—they’re robbing you of joy and nourishment. They’re exhausting your resources for the relationships that do matter.
Letting go of relationship clutter isn’t about tossing people out like tatty pairs of shoes. It’s about getting reflective if our relationships honor our soul self. Is there respect, love, and a sense of wanting the best for each other?
Find ways to distance yourself from relationships that drain your soul. Don’t burn bridges, though. Don’t hold onto every issue or argument. It’s more gracious—and better for you—just walk away, head held high, mouth shut. You’ll be glad you did it that way.
Idea for Impact: To get rid of clutter is to make room for more supportive and nurturing relationships.
Each Temperament Has Its Own Language
From Dr. Irmgard Schlögl’s The Wisdom of the Zen Masters (1976) (she was later Ven. Myokyo-ni, Rinzai Zen Buddhist nun at the Zen Centre in London):
An elder Zen monk on his pilgrimage put up in a monastery. He came across another monk who was also on the pilgrimage. The two discovered that they had much in common, and decided next morning to continue together.
They came to a river where the ferryboat had just left. The elder took a seat to wait for its return. His new friend continued however, walking over the water.
Halfway across, he turned around and beckoned the elder to follow, “You can do it, too. Just have confidence and tread on.” The elder shook his head and stayed put.
“If you are scared, I’ll help you across. You see I can do it without much trouble.” Yet again, the elder shook his head.
The other reached the other bank of the river. He waited there until the ferry had brought the elder over. “Why did you hang back like that?” he asked.
“And what have you gained by rushing like that?” replied the elder.
“Had I known what you were like, I would not have taken up company with you.”
Wishing him farewell, the elder resumed his pilgrimage on his own.
Temperament clashes exist to some extent in almost all relationships. The language of camaraderie that two people share so effortlessly at some moments can unravel at others.
Sometimes each person believes they are deliberately communicating their needs and values, when indeed little gets through because each is working from different core assumptions and expectations—conveying and interpreting language, gestures, and intent differently, or seeking a different set of signals.
Idea for Impact: Each temperament has its own language.
Each of us has our own expectations of relating in an interpersonal relationship. When there are problems, don’t always attempt to “fix” them or back off and distance yourself. Simply give the other more space to be who they are. Seek to understand.
Avoid Blame Language
Refrain from using the terms “always” and “never” when you’re in a disagreement.
Making statements like “You never think about anyone but yourself” or “You always ignore how I feel!” provokes defensiveness because of the apparent exaggeration.
The actual conversation gets abstracted because the other person understandably resists the all-or-nothing argument.
Making negative judgments or proclamations about the other in extreme, absolute terms gives no wiggle room because making global attacks on their entire personality.
Idea for Impact: Try to voice your concerns in a way that focuses on your own feelings and how the other’s behavior affects you. Try “I” statements, such as “I feel neglected when you make plans without me.”
Mindfulness Can Disengage You from Others
This BBC article warns that mindfulness has a way of stirring people to think of themselves in more independent—not interdependent—terms:
A recent study suggests that, in some contexts, practicing mindfulness really can exaggerate some people’s selfish tendencies. With their increased inward focus, they seem to forget about others and are less willing to help those in need.
To counteract these effects, experts suggest other mindfulness techniques such as “loving-kindness meditation” (deliberately thinking about our sense of connection with others) and “mindful listening” (paying particular attention to another’s descriptions of emotional situations.)
Mindfulness is an expansive nonjudgmental awareness of one’s experiences. While mindfulness may help you get a deeper understanding of yourself and comprehend “you” and “your mind stuff” deeper, it takes deep listening, sensitivity, and empathy to learn about “others” and “you and others.” As you tune more into yourself, you should become more able to tune into others.
The original practice and philosophy of mindfulness meditation actually consist of many of these other features mentioned in the BBC article. Somehow, those notions have gotten lost in the monetization and industrialization of mindfulness in the West.
The Unlikely Barrier to True Diversity
As much as companies like to tout diversity, the definitive rule of getting ahead at work is to be likable—to follow the unwritten set of norms and adhere to your company’s culture. That is, you must fit and mix well with the rest of the “gang.”
As I’ve written before, likeability is a significant predictor of success. Well-liked people, especially those who work well with others, will advance. Those who aren’t very likable don’t usually get as far. If your company is conservative, you should be conservative. If the leadership is aggressive, snappy, and rule-bending, be the same. It’s better to be “one of them” to progress your career and endear yourself to your colleagues and higher-ups.
Every grouping of people, whatever the institution, community, or population, has an unwritten set of norms. It’s true for nations, in social groups, sports teams, and businesses. Wherever people form a group, they organically form rules. They institutionalize ways of doing things, traditions, and unquestioned assumptions. Such norms give the group a sense of identity. It’s natural. It’s tribe mentality. We, humans, are social creatures, and this is how we foster a sense of belonging.
Affinity Bias
Per affinity bias, human nature is such that people instinctively associate other people with labels, relate, and play favorites. Groups establish the norms and embrace and propagate them. The resulting categorization not only resists differences but also initiates prejudice and favoritism.
In professional settings, most workplaces tend to hire similar people and encourage them to think and work in the same way. I’ve previously written,
Even if nearly all corporate mission statements extol the virtues of “valuing differences,” managers stifle individuality down in the trenches. They are less willing to be receptive to different viewpoints. They seek to mold their employees to conform to the existing culture of the workplace and to comply with the existing ways of doing things. Compliant, acquiescent employees who look the part are promoted in preference to exceptional, questioning employees who bring truly different perspectives to the table. The nail that sticks its head up indeed gets hammered down.
Defining, fostering, and defending a corporate culture often becomes an exercise in clarifying ‘this is who we are’ and ‘this is who we are not.’ It engenders a strong norm, which builds an even more significant incentive to get people to think alike, get on, and tolerate or repel incompatible people.
Idea for Impact: Culture is a Barrier to Diversity and Inclusion
Culture is the unlikely—if unintentional—barrier to true diversity. Culture has a pernicious effect on hiring. It gives people ample reason to favor and engage who they believe to be “the right people.”
Five Ways … You Could Score Points with Your Boss
- Know that your job is to help the boss win. If you’re not sure what exactly represents success for your boss, ask. Keep her goals in mind when presenting ideas. Minimize your use of her time and resources.
- Keep track of everything your boss puts on your plate. Let her realize that if she assigns something to you, it’s either going to be handled, or you’ll bring it back up with her for a follow-up.
- Size up your boss’s style. Is she a delegator (don’t overwhelm her with detailed updates) or a hand-holder (involve her in making decisions—even if to ask, “Does that sound right to you?”)? Match up your boss’s communication preferences.
- Identify your boss’s pet peeves. Is it being late to appointments, dropping by unexpectedly, bringing a problem to her without suggesting a remedy, or coming to a meeting unprepared? Avoid them like land mines.
- Take upon yourself any aspect of your boss’s job that she doesn’t find particularly interesting. You’ll improve her work-life quality. (And you’ll broaden your experiences and become noticeable to other leaders.)
Bonus: If she’s a good boss, tell her. Few people think to say it. Praise, but don’t flatter.
People Give Others What They Themselves Want // Summary of Greg Chapman’s The Five Love Languages
The amount of practice on an instrument is the most significant contributor to musical performance success. However, an obsessive orientation toward practice can burn you out and make you stiff.
Rather than carving out more time in the day for practice, celebrated musicians (not unlike specialist athletes and chess masters) tend to excel by making modest levels of practice more productive.
Like all great teachers, virtuoso violinist Itzhak Perlman preaches not too much practice:
When kids ask me for an autograph, I always sign my name and then write, ‘Practise slowly!’ That’s my message to them. If you practise slowly, you forget slowly. If you practise very quickly, maybe it will work for a day or two and then it will go away, because it has not been absorbed by your brain. It’s like putting a sponge in the water. If you let it stay there it retains a lot of water.
There are a lot of people who believe that the more you practise the greater the improvement, but I don’t believe that. Again I cite the sponge example. When you put a sponge in the water, after a while it reaches saturation point. Keeping it in there for any longer won’t help, as it’s absorbed as much as it can.
Choosing to focus on quality over quantity of practice helps musicians free up time for score study, concentrated listening, and other learning activities away from their instruments. All these ultimately make practice more effective.
Idea for Impact: Mindless repetition is ineffective. To reach the highest levels of expertise, focus on the quality of practice. Skill formation relies on consistency and deliberate practice. Under a mentor’s guidance, a consistent and intentional practice can bring about clarity and make you observe yourself and open for feedback.