plans
What I Learned about Motivation on My Summer Vacation
I’ve just returned from a two-week vacation in Israel, Jordan and Spain – and I am writing this email saddled with incredible jet lag, some squishy new love handles made from gelato, falafel and Manchego cheese, and many beautiful memories to last a lifetime.
What made this trip so special for me? My sole travel companion was my 15-year-old son, Jacob.
I knew that we would both enjoy sampling the local cuisines (luckily, gelato is always a local cuisine), taking history tours, shopping, swimming, and just wandering around. And I also knew that this trip would benefit from planning beyond flights, excursions, and lodging. It would require us to shift from a task focus (the what, where, when, and how of getting the trip off the ground) to a relationship focus (the who we were — separately and together – and why we were choosing to do this together.)
Admittedly, it’s that kind of focus that busy, driven people who are motivated by getting things crossed off their to-do lists often neglect — and the costs of that neglect include the loss of connection, collaboration, ownership, engagement, and meaning.
I didn’t want to look back on this trip and only be proud of what we did, where we went and how we got there. I wanted to look back on this trip and be proud of who we were and what we built together.
Can you think of a partnership or team you work on (or live with) that could benefit from a little more of that?
Here are 10 questions I asked my son and myself before our trip that you can bring to your next staff meeting, board meeting or Labor Day vacation.
- What’s our purpose for doing this?
- What could we do that would have each of us jump out of bed in the morning with excitement to get started?
- What would make each of us want to crawl back into bed and say, “I’ll pass”?
- What have we done in the past that we want to make sure we repeat?
- What have we done in the past that we want to make sure we don’t repeat?
- What do we each want to learn/get better at/get smarter about?
- How might we veto something that one of us really doesn’t like/doesn’t want to do?
- How should we let the other person know when we’re feeling stressed/sad/tired/overwhelmed/frustrated?
- How should we ask for personal time/space without it feeling “personal”?
- What would we want our sound bite about this [project/task/challenge/opportunity/trip] to be a month after? Six months after? A year after? 10 years after?
Goals Interrupted: Notes from a Funeral
Despite the fact that I had a to-do list a mile-long today, my day was disrupted by a funeral. The brother of a friend, young guy, 3 kids, heart attack – never saw it coming. And the fact that my work day was interrupted by an event I didn’t and couldn’t plan for clearly paled in comparison to a life interrupted. Lives interrupted. Changed forever.
I paid a shiva call this evening, and found myself talking with the eldest daughter of the man who passed away. Despite the fact that it is a small world — and an even smaller Jewish world — we were suprised to find that we had attended the same High School, Stuyvesant, and even the same Junior High, Robert F. Wagner — 10 years apart. New York is not that small — and it felt bashert to have something to talk about that would provide a welcome distraction.
As we mused about teachers we shared, I started to remember the plans I had made for myself so many years ago. I was going to be a doctor (and not just to make my mom kvell). I was a serious science student, a decorated science fair champion, and had an addiction to Trapper John M.D. reruns that set the course for later med-head addictions to E.R. (during the Clooney years only), Grey’s Anatomy, and even Scrubs. I followed those plans up through my freshman pre-med year of college, when I realized that organic chem might only be foreshadowing for future academic horrors to come.
I had had lots of plans, and of all the plans that I made, only one concrete youthful plan actually came to fruition — being a mom. And I can honestly say that I don’t look back on any of the plans that I made and then changed, interrupted or ignored with regret. I do know that the one plan I actually fulfilled is the one that has defined my life the most.
We never, ever know when we will run out of time to fulfill our plans, our dreams, our goals. What goal have you achieved that most defines who you are? What else do you want to achieve? What are you waiting for?
And how can I help?
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