There are so many possible interpretations to the phrase “seeing the light.”

I’m an amateur photographer, so “seeing the light” is something we are encouraged to do when making a photograph. “Where is the light coming from? What is the angle of the light? What is the quality and color of the light?” All questions we don’t think about when most of us are just taking pictures.

“Seeing the light” has been tied to revelations that have been made to us about something. “Ah, now I see the light.”

But for me, “seeing the light” is seeing someone’s light – the thing that makes them glow.

I’m not referring to their personality or a skill set they may own, I’m referring to the inner light they let out for the world to see.

In most people, you have to look for it.

Back to photography for a moment. Everyone has an expression that captures their light, but you really have to work to get it. We cover over our natural light with so many modifiers that it’s difficult to see it in its purest form, but I’ve come to know it’s there.

People whose light comes out naturally are people you gravitate towards. Most of us have to work at it but there are those who just radiate their light without effort. These are people who have something we want but we just can’t seem to put our finger on what that something is. It’s their light.

They unknowingly provide a sense of a safe haven when you’re in their company and that’s one of the many reasons you want to be around them.

We all have that light; we just have to recognize that it’s available and then go to work on letting it shine. That means that we have to un-board the doors and windows that are keeping it from adding to the light of day.

A good place to start is to let go of pretense. Notice that the person filled with light has none. Dropping our “airs” takes pretense out of the air and let’s more light through.

Also notice that the person with abundant light takes the time to experience you. They may be labeled a “good listener” but what’s really going on is that they are with you when you’re with them. They are not off rehearsing their next thought; they are there for you and it feels good to bask in that type of light.

Make it a practice to seek the light in yourself and others; it’s an illuminating way to approach your day and it’s the closest you’ll ever get to picture perfect.

All the best,

John

We’re all “good” at something. We may not shout it from the rooftops but in our quiet moments we know that we do something, probably better than most.

It’s more than an opinion about our special skill because it’s been validated by others too many times to be self aggrandizement.

So what do you do with your special brand of magic? Use it for the benefit of others and yourself. That gives your magic a purpose, rather than just being something that you can do.

Early on, I found that my special skill was finding flaws – not a skill that’s easily marketed. I could meet someone and know what their shortfall was in an instant. I found out quickly that people don’t like hearing what’s wrong with them.

It’s still a work in progress for me but I had to find some other magic to balance my natural tendency to spot spots. That skill was helping people find a way out of tough spots.

That meant I had to find a way to have them reconnect with their internal resources to have them find a remedy. That’s when my skill set became marketable.

Like I said, it’s still a work in progress for me because I sometimes find myself to be “heavy handed” on the front end of my approach.

My friends would call it being “direct.” Others who don’t want to protect my feelings that much call it “throwing a hand grenade under the table.” Both are apt descriptions.

There are times that direct works best, but not all the time. That’s what I’ve come to realize over time.

But enough about me. How do you make sure your brand of sorcery isn’t just black magic?

Get curious about what you’re not so good at that would add some balance to your brand of magic.

Are you a great hostess who wants their own restaurant but are uneducated when it comes to business? Bone up on the business end or you’ll be out of business before you begin one.

Are you a gifted musician whose family and friends tell you how talented you are but the only crowds you are playing for are at family picnics? Find an employed musician, with no more skills than you, and find out what they’re doing and start doing that.

There is a push-pull effect when you find the complimentary skill to your magic. It pushes you to do more and it pulls you out of potentially deadly tailspins.

You can certainly defend your brand of magic and not search for its compliment. My personal experience with that approach is that you’ll be pulling less rabbits out of hats and trying to pull a solution out of your ass.

All the best,

John

“Everyone runs patterns but how many of your patterns are running you?” That’s what The Grasshopper asked yesterday.

It immediately reminded me of what the celebrated, Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung said many moons ago: “Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate.”

Most of our patterned behavior is out of our awareness. You may not be aware but your pattern of walking is unique to you. No one walks exactly like you or talks exactly like you. Most people are unaware of their pattern of walking or their pattern of speech. It just runs in the background without us noticing.

Unless your pattern of walking or talking is getting in your way, it will probably go on unnoticed without any side effects.

But suppose you are a broadcaster in the midwest with a thick New York accent and you’re attempting to blend in with the locals. You may run into some difficulty if you don’t go to work on your pattern of speech.

Our attitudes and beliefs are also patterns, and make no mistake, they run us; we don’t run them, until we take time to notice.

Noticing is the first step toward change, or as Jung said, “making the unconscious conscious.”

Once our pattern is in the light of day, we can begin the work of outgrowing it. Many people, when they have a counterproductive pattern pointed out to them, go into justification mode. They start arguing for their limitations. As long as they continue to argue, the pattern will stay in place. Once the excuses cease, then there is an opportunity for growth.

Noticing is the first step and interrupting is the second and final step. Once you recognize a pattern running, to outgrow it, it’s incumbent upon you to interrupt it in midstream. Once you interrupt, you put a wedge between what was about to be repeated and what’s possible.

It’s in that gap that new patterns begin to form. It’s in that gap that change begins.

So, you won’t begin to solve a problem until you notice you have one and you won’t outgrow it until you employ the wedge of interruption.

The interruption wedge is not a one-time fix. It’s like home teeth whitening. You have to apply the treatment regularly to start seeing the results.

If your life is not running in the direction you want, stop running away from your patterns. Stop and take notice and then consciously apply the wedge of interruption, then you’ll be in the running.

All the best,

John

I recently read the origin of the expression “Sour Grapes.” Some say it came from the Bible and others claim it’s an Aesop fable. Either way, the story goes like this:

A fox sees some grapes on a vine above him. He jumps and jumps attempting to get some but after many leaps, he can’t reach them. He covers over his failure by pretending disdain for what he cannot have by labeling the grapes as “sour” and thus unworthy of his approval.

Are you sour?

What is it that you can’t admit to wanting?

It’s my experience that many people who disparage others for what they have have a desire to have the same thing, but cannot get it.

They hide their envy under the guise of disdain and it often comes out in disparaging or sarcastic refrains:

“He/She has no idea what it’s like to work for a living.”

“Must be nice to be able to have someone else mow your grass.”

“What they spend on vacation could feed hungry children for a year.”

Again, I believe we want some of the same things, but can’t bring ourselves to the point of us being responsible for getting them.

This goes well past material desires. We may be jealous of another’s happiness, physical appearance, social graces etc. The list is extensive.

The first step on the road to sweeter grapes is admission. It doesn’t have to be a public gathering with a soapbox. Just admit to yourself that you want certain things without castigating others for having them.

Years ago, I remember reading that if you want what another has, don’t envy them; emulate them.

But it’s difficult to emulate that which you claim to disdain. That’s why admission is the first step.

Once admission has happened, we can then start emulating. Find out what they do to get what they have. Want to have the wisdom of Benjamin Franklin? Read his autobiography. Want to take photographs like Annie Leibovitz? Study her work. Want the carefree attitude of your neighbor? Invite her to lunch and pick her brain.

Want more fruits from your labor? Start dining on a diet of admission and emulation and you’ll sidestep the grapes of wrath.

All the best,

John

Springtime has finally arrived in the northeast US – just in the nick of time.

As I was having my 2nd cup of tea this morning, I gave notice to the “Christmas Cactus” that’s blooming in our front window. The Grasshopper gave me this horticultural handout: “Blooming is the job of the flower.”

It sounded like a line from the old TV show Kung Fu until I let it germinate for a bit.

It seems we can plant seeds, cultivate them, give them water and nutrients but when it comes to blooming, we really have no role or control.

The flower or plant will bloom on its own or not.

Have you planted something, followed all the recommended protocols and still got no bloom for the buck? Stop fretting. You did all you could do – the blooming is not up to you.

I know the Home and Garden Show comes to my area in February, not a time of year for natural blooming. So the growers “force bloom” the flowers under artificial conditions so they’ll be attractive for the show.

Artificially blooming with people is a disservice. It doesn’t allow them to blossom on their own: to have their own trials, failures and successes. This causes them to seek out artificial methods – shortcuts – as the norm rather than the exception.

Shortcuts will cut your successes short. You may look good for the show but you go home and wilt.

If you’re into force blooming, let me borrow a phrase from my photography teacher, Peter Hurley: “Stop it now!”

This is the time of year things bloom on their own. Get out of the way and let it happen or not. You’ve done your job; now let them do theirs.

All the best,

John

The Grasshopper must prefer being heard during dog walks because he delivered this one yesterday during the daily pooch prance: “Life’s drama unfolds when we argue about the way it should be versus the way it is.”

I remember Jerry Stocking saying years ago that elongating your initial reaction turns into drama. That seems to be the case.

The reaction is this: “It shouldn’t be this way” and the longer we hold on to that reaction, the more drama we will produce.

We can’t help reacting to certain things; the reaction is there instantly without our permission. But the time frame the reaction stays with us is completely up to us.

So the real question is: How much less drama do you want in your life?

The remedy comes from a phrase I learned in a management seminar over 20 years ago: “Shorten the Storm.”

Shorten the storm in this case means to recognize that you are elongating your reaction and to choose a different response.

Imagine that someone cuts you off in traffic. Your initial, unplanned reaction is a tirade against the driver. Once you utter every curse word you can send their way, you are at a choice point. Do I let this continue or do I let it end. If you choose continue, you have chosen drama.

Seriously, how many go rounds do you have to have in your head about this incident to conclude that this person is an asshole? My guess is not more than one. Continuing on with the diatribe in your head, ad nauseam, will cause you to regurgitate drama.

Drama is produced by attempting to take something that is and pretend that going on and on about it will turn it into the way it should be. That never happens. Drama is always ineffective and never accomplishes changing “is” into “isn’t.”

We can all fold up our drama rather quickly by learning a lesson from my golfing buddy, Chris. When Chris hits a bad shot, he has his initial reaction which lasts under 10 seconds and then he’s on to the next shot. It’s one of the reasons I love playing golf with him – No Drama.

I’ll leave you with the message I once saw printed on a t-shirt that actress Uma Thurman was wearing: “Save Your Drama for your Mama.”

All the best,

John

I was wondering aloud if there was a difference between philosophy and ideology and, for me, there is.

It may be a small distinction but one worth our curiosity.

For me philosophy is our thoughts about “the way it is” and ideology seems to be about “the way it should be.”

Both positions can’t be substantiated with any degree of certainty but that doesn’t prevent us from having a philosophy or an ideology.

It feels to me as though ideology is more concrete and philosophy is a bit more porous. I also feel that one’s philosophy can be changed more quickly than our ideology.

I sense that philosophy has a set of premises at its base and ideology has a foundation of rules.

One seems more malleable than the other. Changing your philosophy is changing your own mind. Changing your ideology means changing the rules and that takes a committee.

My sense is that having an ideology boxes you in and a philosophy gives you a way out.

Of course, what I have offered you here is a philosophy – a way out of an ideology.

All the best,

John

What a giant rock we must live under if we haven’t yet heard about living “in the moment” or what author Eckhart Tolle calls “living in the Now.”

I have no quibble with the recommendation; it’s just wonderful counsel from my vantage point. The question that has been confusing to me is: What is a moment?

I know a minute is a precise measurement of time but a moment isn’t as easily defined.

“We had a moment” is a line we’ve heard many times from TV or movies or from a friend or family member. It attempts to describe an experience someone had within a very non-specific time frame. Again, what is a moment?

I’m certain there are multiple answers to the question but here’s one I’ve recently come up with that answers the question for me.

A moment is the time your attention is on something.

The minute your attention goes to something else, you are in a new moment.

So “living in the moment” is a matter of where your attention is and for how long it stays there. The moment is comprised of attention. If you give your full attention to something, you’re “in the moment.”

If your attention is scattered, you’re in and out of many moments in an eye blink and can’t fully appreciate being in the moment for any appreciable amount of time.

So living in the moment is giving your attention to what’s going on now.

We are so conditioned to skipping over now to go to the past or the future that it seems foreign at first to stay focused on right now. It takes vigilant noticing of where our attention is. At first, it takes discipline to get us to stay in the moment. With practice, it starts to become a habit – one worth cultivating.

Life only happens inside of a moment. If you’re not giving it your attention, life is passing you by. Without living in the moment, you can only talk about life rather than live it.

So if you want to remain a bystanding reporter on your life, keep jumping out of the moment. If you want to actually participate in your life, give your attention to what’s happening now and actually experience life.

Here’s our homework assignment: We can create more fulling moments in our life, in a moment’s notice, just by shifting our attention to what is happening now.

All the best,

John

The Grasshopper offered this nugget last night: “Life happens between the question and answer.”

If you ask a question you don’t know the answer to, before the answer comes, you are in the “life zone” – meaning anything can come your way.

Asking questions garners more life.

Want to feel more alive? Ask more questions.

Sometimes we don’t ask questions because we don’t want to know the answers. That keeps us dead in the water and unable to move forward – an anti-life strategy.

This isn’t a recommendation to butt in to peoples’ private business, just an invitation to start asking more questions.

Here’s an acronym to recall the well known biblical recommendations that remind us to ASK:

A. – Ask and you shall receive.

S. – Seek and you shall find.

K. – Knock and the door shall be open.

By asking, you’ll find that “Life” is more than an old magazine or the cereal that Mikey likes; it’s the “real” estate between question and answer.

All the best,

John

The Grasshopper stepped out of his metro-sexual guise and delivered this: “You know you’ve turned the corner when it’s more about comfort than it is about style.”

Turning the corner in this context is what I refer to as “subtraction” or “the trip home.”

Subtracting is taking away the things you thought you needed but didn’t. It generally happens in the second half of life. Subtraction leads to a comfort level within your skin of being who you are without makeup.

This isn’t about giving up worldly goods or wearing sack cloth; it’s finding out that your definition of yourself needs some undressing.

Did you ever noticed that it’s hard to live up to how you define yourself? That’s because you’ve added so much to that persona that it weighs you down – forever trying to hold up the image you are desperately attempting to portray.

Turning the corner is recognizing the comfort below the image. The more you notice, the more comfortable you get. The more comfortable you get leads to the shedding of that image, and there you are in your metaphorical jeans and tee shirt.

Give some reflection on how you think you need to appear and then notice how uncomfortable that is. Then start subtracting piece by piece and begin to experience your peace.

The mission is simple: Make comfort your new style.

All the best,

John