Gratitude
05Dec 2013
We all feel a lot of pressure regarding things we “should do” during the holidays — for our family, friends, co-workers, clients, boss. It gets to the point that the expectations feel overwhelming, and the temptation is just to “shut down” and do nothing (for anyone!) This is typically not a good solution. Let me offer an alternative solution to
02Jul 2013
As I wrote recently, research was released by the Gallup organization that found only 3 out of 10 U.S. employees are actively engaged in their work from a mental, emotional and volitional (a choice of the will) point of view. Conversely, 52% of employees were found to be not engaged and 18% are actively disengaged. This latter group is a
17Nov 2011
Thanksgiving is the holiday where we are encouraged to be thankful for the good things in our lives – health, safety, adequate food, clothing, and shelter, as well as the many material blessings we have. For most people, Thanksgiving is usually more of a personally-focused celebration, including sharing meals and time with family and friends.But the Thanksgiving holiday season can
30May 2011
Memorial Day in the U.S. represents a variety of things to different people: A day off of work (possibly even paid!) The beginning of summer Going to the lake Having a barbeque with friends and family Having to get together with family The Indianapolis 500 Visiting family gravesites Veterans parades and celebrations Watching old war flicks For me, especially when
15May 2011
Life is daily. And sometimes it is hard to see if the choices you are making on a daily basis are leading to the results you desire in your life. During the late spring and early summer, we have some opportunities to stop and reconsider: “Am I living life the way I want to?” “Do my daily and weekly activities
26Apr 2011
The importance of perspective is becoming more clear to me all the time. Perspective implies a viewpoint — a place from which we are looking at our lives and the world around us. Pick a specific spot, a physical location, that you have been to in your life. It could be a beautiful vista overlooking the Grand Canyon, the top
12Jan 2011
I recently have become more interested in and enamored with the stars. I just received a book put out by National Geographic entitled Hubble: Imaging Space and Time with a lot of photos of stars, galaxies and nebulae from the Hubble telescope. Although the following image isn’t from that book, it demonstrates the wonder I am finding in the stars.
10Oct 2010
As I travel, meeting with various families, businesses and organizational leaders, I am exposed to a wide range of people, situations and subcultures (usually within the U.S., but also with English-speaking families overseas [I acknowledge much of my life experience is limited by a North American bias]). These experiences, in combination with the changes occurring within our economy, government and
12May 2010
There is a relatively new field of social science (i.e. the study of social behavior) called behavioral economics. It has been around for about 10 years formally. And two of the leaders in the field (Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky) received a Nobel prize a few years back. As a psychologist, initially I had a bit of a cynical view
21Nov 2009
We usually think of opposites in terms of a simple, “either-or” relationship — such as light and darkness, large and small, heavy and light. And these opposites exist on a single continuum, with the opposing characteristics being on the ends of the spectrum. But there are some relationships which are more complex, where there is more than one characteristic that