From the archives, here’s a quick reminder from The Grasshopper:

“‘Don’t Want’ is a difficult target to hit.”

If you pay careful attention to your language when expressing your desires, you’re likely to notice that you too often give voice to what you don’t want rather than what you do want. That’s a fuzzy target.

Just a slight shift in your approach puts you on a clearer path toward your aspirations. Shift in the direction of declaring what you “Do want.”

There is no guarantee that you’ll get what you do want by making this shift but the odds shift in your favor when you do.

Your odds increase because your mind works better when it has one target to shoot for rather than several to avoid. “Do want” is an exercise in focus and a focused person gets more hits than misses.

Begin to notice how unfocused you are when you use “Don’t want” language. You’re meandering all over the map rather than planting your flag.

“Do want” is a clear statement or vision of what you want. There is no room for wiggle room in a do want declaration. Train yourself to focus on what you do want and notice how clear the goal becomes.

Final thought: You improve your chances to get what you do want when you let what you don’t want go out of focus.

All the best,

John

On Throwback Thursday, here’s a Grasshopper observation from a few years ago:

“Heeding Heads You Home.”

What’s the one piece of advice you need to heed? You may have heard it all your life but actually putting it to use fulfills the promise.

When I was in broadcasting the ubiquitous piece of advice handed out was “Be yourself.” Most broadcasters manufacture a persona and wind up being poor imitations of those whom they’re attempting to emulate. The same is true for the rest of us as well.

“Be yourself” is a piece of advice worth heeding. The trick is to discover who this “self” is.

I can tell you for sure that it’s not the person you made up and pretend to be. That’s the façade you present to the whole world.

The real you is homespun wholeness, not a reflection in a mirror that only shows what’s on the outside.

Nothing needs to be added to the real you. You only need to subtract the layers of pretending to arrive home where everything is taken care of. The real you lives at home, not travelling with the carnival.

Arriving home is a journey. It begins with noticing that your travels away are not getting you the peace you seek. The next step is subtracting the bumper stickers of culture that you’ve accumulated over the years – the things that you “must” have or do that haven’t done it for you.

Once you begin the subtractive process, you automatically feel lighter and intuitively know you are on a path to home.

If you’re still waiting for the “one thing” that’s going to do it for you, you’ll be waiting forever. Perhaps it’s time to heed the advice of “Be yourself” and start your journey home.

All the best,

John

As we head into the holidays, here’s a useful reminder from The Grasshopper:

“The Need To Be Right Keeps Us Disagreeable.”

As far as I can tell, being right is the biggest impediment to arriving at agreement.

We all have opinions and the fun thing about them is they don’t have to be backed up by facts. When opinions get in the way is when we claim they are true. That’s when we declare we’re right and agreement gets left out.

I just Googled the number of organized religions in the world; there are over 4000. I’m sure a number of them are worshipping the “one true God.” Religious wars weren’t relegated to the 16th Century; they’re going on all over the world in 2016.

Agreement will remain absent in the world of being right, whether in religion or politics or any other area where we conflate opinion with truth.

I’m not on a pilgrimage for World Peace; I’m just attempting to water down right a bit so it can flow into agreement.

The first step is to separate right from true. True can only be one way. Real truth has no opposite. That’s why it’s so rare. If what you are right about has an opposite, it can’t be true. The next step is to separate right from opinion. The reason we do both of these things is so we can get to agreement.

Our conditioning is this: When we claim to be right, the person with another opinion is wrong. Remember the awful feeling of being made wrong. We do that to another every time we claim to be right. Reminds me of a story . . .

Years ago, my business partner was having a difference of opinion with his boss. We’ve all been there. After exchanging viewpoints, my partner said, “Well, that’s my opinion.” His boss replied in his outside voice, “Your opinion is wrong!”

If you’re having trouble getting to agreement, you’re on the wrong track. We arrive at wrong by being right.

The formula for agreement is subtraction. Start by subtracting the truth and then take away right. Once these roadblocks are removed, “Agreement Avenue” is within sight.

All the best,

John

Let’s call it “Memory Monday” and revisit a Grasshopper musing from many Mondays ago.

“Success Lies Outside Your Comfort Zone.”

It’s my experience that marginal results come from staying inside our zone of comfort. If you claim you want success, you can’t refrain from moving towards the edge.

Many years ago, my hypnosis teacher, Dr. Dave Dobson use to say, “The luscious, ripe fruit is out on the skinny branches.” That picture he painted stays with me ’til this day and serves as a reminder that risk is a necessary part of reward.

The sales profession comes to mind. I’m sure there are some people who are very successful selling merchandise at parties out of their home – Tupperware, jewelry, makeup, etc. I’m also certain the successful ones are the exception rather than the rule. The bulk of the unsuccessful ones think they are professional sales people. They’re not. They are presenters and order takers. The successful sellers know the “dog and pony” show is only part of the skill set. They also know that future business isn’t going to come to them; they are going to have to seek it out.

That requires getting out of your comfort zone and making requests of “strangers.”

The life insurance industry knows they are going to have a large washout rate with beginning insurance sales people. They provide them training and then send them out to sell. Once these people pitch all their relatives and the neighbors they are “comfortable” with, their sales come to a standstill.

They all have a product to sell but most can’t sell it because they refuse to move out of their comfort zone. Here’s the ever-present excuse for failure to sell: “Oh, I’m just not a sales person.” Sorry, everyone is a sales person. The reason they’re not successful is because they won’t do what’s necessary – move out of their comfort zone.

We’re always selling something to somebody; it’s the give and take of life. That’s sales. To get better at sales, we need to make more requests. It’s really that simple. The first step to making a sale is making a request.

Want to get more sales in life? Make more requests. “But I’m not comfortable asking people for things,” you say. Then get used to not having what you want. I, again, for the zillionth time quote my 4th grade teacher, Miss Wagner: “You can either have what you want or your reasons why not.” Comfort is the reason you’re not successful.

You can either stay in your comfort zone (rut) or you can ask for what you want. Those are the plain and simple choices.

If you’re not in the habit of making requests, start. You can begin small and work your way up. But start now. When you branch out of your comfort zone, you start gathering in the fruits of you labor.

All the best,

John

The Grasshopper was up early this morning and delivered this nugget:

“If you’re looking for something wrong, you’ll find something wrong.”

I remember when my wife from another life used to manage a bank branch and had FDIC inspectors coming in. I recall her saying, “No matter how well we run our branch they’ll find something wrong. It’s their job and their job security depends on it.”

How often do we discolor what we discover by filtering it through a “wrong” filter?

Have you ever seen a newspaper cartoon with the heading: “What’s right with this picture?”

I’m not suggesting rose colored glasses that make us look for only what’s right. It’s more of a nudge to experience life rather than prejudge it.

“I heard this movie is going to suck.” What do you think you’ll be filtering for when you watch the film?

Preconditions take away options – viable options that may never surface in their presence.

We limit ourselves when we filter our options. “What do you want? Chinese or Mexican?” There is a whole menu of options being ignored with that limiting filter.

Options lead to discoveries and it’s hard for me to find something wrong with that.

All the best,

John

Here’s a Grasshopper definition that popped in this morning:

“Immaturity: What you say is more important than what you do.”

There are people who live their whole life by that definition. You will easily recognize them: they time and again disappoint.

Are your lips in service of your deeds or otherwise?

Do you tell people what you think they want to hear OR can you be counted on?

Your soul searching answer to that question will determine your level of maturity.

To grow up, you have to outgrow your excuses.

You can continue to make excuses or you can make progress. It’s a choice.

Step one of this one-step program is: Stop talking and start doing.

An excuse is a delaying tactic towards a seat at the adult table. Just like a boxer who hugs his opponent after taking a severe blow, you are hanging on until your next excuse gathers energy.

You will always be judged by your actions, not your words. Quoting legendary football coach Bill Parcells, “You are what your record says you are.”

There’s a difference between “childish” and “childlike”: One stunts your growth; the other propels your forward. Find your childlike curiosity and use it to outgrow your excuses and claim your maturity.

All the best,

John

Oh, is it “Way Back Wednesday” already? Just so happens I have a Grasshopper quote from “back in the day” that is just as useful today.

“Notice Your Reactions And You’ll Notice Your Patterns.“

We are all creatures of habit and no more is that so than when we are reacting.
The way to outgrow a reaction is to notice it just before it is about to happen or while it’s happening. That’s a choice point. You are noticing your patterned reaction about to kick in or you are noticing it in midstream. Either way, you have an opportunity to make an alternate choice – one not so predictable or limiting.

We have a patterned way of reacting. Just notice your answers to the “What would you do?” type questions. A friend in a predicament asks, “What would you do if you were me?” Notice that you give a patterned answer. It may or may not be a valuable answer, but you can bet that it’s a reactive one.

You draw on your patterned way of doing things. That pattern has gotten you a certain percentage of victories and defeats. The percentage will remain the same throughout your life if your patterns remain the same.

When you begin to notice your reactions to things, you give yourself an opportunity to notice your patterns and grow. What is your reaction to a person from the political party you don’t support when they espouse one of their tried, true and “tired” talking points? How about the commercial on TV glowingly advertising a product you know is “crap.” What is your reaction? I have just cited two of my reactions; there are hundreds, if not thousands, more that I own.

The real question is: Do I own them or do they own me? Sadly, they own me until . . . I notice.

Do you want to be defined by a reaction? You already are because your reactions own you.

Do you want to be the stimulus or do you want to be the reaction?

If you want to be the reaction, do nothing and nothing will change. If you want to be the stimulus, you have to notice that you are reacting and interrupt that reaction.

We have to employ a third element in order to outgrow our reactions. We currently only use two – Stimulus and Reaction. Our whole life is on a predictable track until we notice. Noticing is the third element. It’s the switch that can put us on a new track.

You can continue to defend your reactions or you can notice and interrupt them and find out, with more certainty, if they’re worth defending.

It could just as easily be said: Notice your prejudices and you’ll notice your patterns. A prejudice is nothing more than a conditioned reaction.

You either want to grow or you don’t. If you do, start noticing the reactions that cause you to stew. It’s the first step in cooking up something new.

All the best,

John

Here’s a Grasshopper musing worth revisiting:

Ripening Is A Reality; Time Is A Concept

We are all aging. You can take that to the bank. “Age is just a number” we’ve often heard said. Yet, too many have become focused on how many minutes they’ve been alive or how many they have left until they’re dead.

Aging happens; time is an illusion.

We didn’t make up aging but we did invent something to explain it – Time.

It takes so many sunrises and sunsets to determine how ripe an apple is. The time it takes has nothing to do with the apple ripening. Aging is a process that happens all on its own, independent of whether we have a measurement or not.

An apple will come into this world, grow and decay without a clock in the orchard.

Moments can’t be measured in minutes. “We had a moment” often means time had stopped. We stopped measuring our experiences for a moment and just lived them.

Time is a useful invention. Where it becomes counterproductive is when we treat it as real. That’s when we cheat ourselves out of moments. How long was that unforgettable embrace? When you start to measure it, you come out of the moment and back into time where you clock watch from birth ‘til death.

The way to miss a moment is to time it. It feels so much better to live it.

Take a moment to live your moments and watch time go away. You’ll begin to live your life rather than measuring it day to day.

All the best,

John

As we head into Thanksgiving, it may be valuable to reflect on this old Grasshopper musing that brings responsibility back home for the holidays.

Life’s Biggest Cop Out: I’m Not Responsible For Me

The truth is: We’re always able to respond. We just keep picking the response that says we’re not responsible.

What you do is on you. It’s that simple.

If we focus on our actions vs. our reasons, we see clearly that the onus is on us.

How much of our life is spent attempting to explain away our actions? It’s a diversion from ownership that keeps us renting reasons that have the strength of wet cardboard.

Spend some time around prisoners, people who have been convicted beyond a reasonable doubt, and you will see how rampant this universal denial of responsibility is in the face of hard, cold facts.

There is freedom that comes with responsibility. When we begin to own our actions, we start taking action to become unshackled from our lies.

Telling the truth is a response that releases us from copping out.

Take ownership of your response and you become responsible — something in short supply in a world steeped in cover stories.

It’s almost certain that if you lean in the direction of taking responsibility, you’ll take one on the chin. It’s often the blow we need to loosen our denial and finally own this un-refuted truth: I’m responsible for me.

All the best,

John

On “Flashback Friday” I found this “important” concept from The Grasshopper: “Importance Only Exists In Our Mind.”

How many things are important? I’m sure you have a list. But did you ever stop to consider that importance doesn’t exist. It’s something we made up.

Just sample the assertions below and start to get a feel for the nonexistence of importance.

“It’s important that we go to work on this.”
“We are doing important work.”
“This is the most important issue of our time.”

Says who?

And how many debates have you been in about the importance of something? You were debating something that doesn’t exist: Importance. It’s just a concept in our mind.

How many other concepts are we in endless debate about? “Essential?” “Imperative?” “Fair?” “Right?” The list goes on forever.

Concepts mean different things to different people but we treat them as though they are solid things set in concrete.

I’m not lobbying for the eradication of concepts, just for the noticing of them. Notice that they aren’t real things.

I also have a suggestion about a phrase to use when discussing concepts. This phrase will end the debate about the universal concreteness of the concept and shine a light on what you are truly attempting to communicate.

The phrase is: “To me.”

“It’s important to me that we have this done by Friday.” “It only seems fair to me that we pay them the full amount.” “That feels right to me.”

By adding “to me” to the concept, you have taken the debate away from an illusionary concept and shifted the focus to your desires. It takes the conversation to a more personal level. You are no longer debating about something “out there” but rather something “in here.”

It takes some noticing and some practice to make concepts less concrete and more personal, and the effort is “worth it” to me.

All the best,

John