Hi Friend,
Last night was wild. I went to the Parliament Funkadelic with George Clinton concert at the Criterion in downtown OKC. It was a chaotic frenetic audio assault on my soul. My ears are still ringing this morning. George is 82 years old and still an energized master of ceremonies. I was inspired for what I could be doing in my 80’s. The 15-20 member band was simply unbelievable!
This past week I also got to be in the Smoky Mountains. It was my first time there. I spoke at an executive leadership retreat outside of Pigeon Forge at a cabin-mansion. Actually it was a whole neighborhood of cabin-mansions that hosted such events or family gatherings. I flew in a bit early, so I got a lunch and set up my office in the Smoky Mountain National Park.
I love music and I love the outdoors, so it’s pretty easy to reflect on this week and be incredibly grateful. This week also contained fear, pain, heartache, doubt, exhaustion, anticipation, delay, heat and enough other elements that if I chose to focus on them, I might not be so grateful. Isn’t that the trick to gratitude? You just have to find one thing!
I probably could rename this the Weekly Gratitudor. Every single week I reflect that’s the strongest sentiment that appears. I know people who live with a lot of heaviness, pain and challenge while still remaining thankful. What’s more amazing to me is people who have so much and are NOT grateful. That’s such an unattractive quality.
The Delusion of Focus
Have you ever been in an argument with someone and the crux of the disagreement was because you were both focused on different aspects of the incident? Or worse you started focusing on the specific words that were just previously said in the discussion and now one of you is dialed-in on what was just said instead of the content of the conversation? The magnification focus brings is startling!
The leaders I spoke to this week, I hold in very high regard. They are well read and more importantly they remember what they read!! (what a gift). They’ve also previously had Patrick Lencioni, Jocko Willink & Chris McChesney as their speakers at this event. I don’t really do intimidation, but doubt did attempt to stir insecurity. I had to consciously focus on what I did know about me and why I was there. Thankfully it went really really well!
Can We All Be Adam Sandler?
Adam won the Mark Twain Prize this past year. His speech deeply impacted me. If you have 12 minutes go here and watch it. He basically says his parents and siblings were all incredibly supportive, then he married a woman who thought he was amazingly funny and of course he creates projects with his buddies who think he’s funny. He mentioned the critics for a moment but was much more satisfied to listen to those who loved him. #DelusionalInTheBestWay
There are plenty of Adam Sandler haters. He’s not moved by them and the quality of his life sounds immensely rich because he’s enabled to focus on the positive. You may find it an unrealistic approach to life and think it’s just because he has loads of money he can get away with it. I don’t. We all “PAY” attention. It costs us equally where we fix our gaze. Where do you focus most?
Instigating Ideas…
1. They say you have to repeat yourself 9 times to be heard: Go in nature, go to a concert!
2. What are you focused on that needs less attention?
3. Encourage someone who is finding gratitude in a difficult situation.
4. Maybe watch Happy Gilmore?
There’s no brilliant insight here. You and I know that what we concentrate on gets disproportionately enlarged. What if instead of letting circumstances or people capture our attention, we wrote down what we wanted to find in life: Love, gratitude, joy, fulfillment, energy, purpose and meaning – using them as a look-through-lens throughout our day and week?
Focus is a Filter
I’ve heard we live in an “attention economy”. Everyone is fighting to get our attention. They want to sell us something or convince of us their perspective. Let’s choose neither. We can mostly decide where to fixate. By choosing where to look we also choose where NOT to look.
Though I will say I couldn’t take my eyes off of PFunklast night. Their excellence, energy and exuberance entirely enthralled me and I couldn’t look away! How could the above look-through-lens traits become the PFunk of our focus? I suspect nature and music could play a part.
I hope this week you see all the best things happening in your life.