Exploring My Rules: Be Honest

Posted on January 25, 2019 by admin

Time for the next entry in the series about my rules. This post will focus on one of my most important rules, both for interacting with other people and dealing with myself: Be honest.

I believe honesty is morally right and that intentionally deceiving other people is wrong. That’s the primary reason I do my best to always be honest and, even if I had no other reason to value the truth, I would still support it on grounds of principle. However, I also believe honesty is useful in everyday life. Honesty facilitates trust, which is essential in all relationships, whether they be familial, friendship, romantic, business, or anything else. Lying breaks that trust, sometimes irreparably, and drives people away. Telling the truth garners respect and strengthens trust, especially when it’s difficult or inconvenient to do so.

Further, there’s more to honesty than simply avoiding directly lying. Intentionally concealing important information when asked about a particular situation or phrasing things in such a way as to mislead someone are both examples of dishonesty. It can be embarrassing to admit that I don’t know something, but being straightforward about it generally earns respect from others and prevents a number of problems that would likely arise if I lied. That’s why I’d rather clumsily tell the truth than smoothly tell a lie. 

In addition to being honest with other people, I also do my best to be honest with myself. This includes following my rules to the best of my ability, avoiding hypocrisy by keeping my actions consistent with my thoughts and words, and doing things that I have told myself I will do. Also, and perhaps most importantly, I strive to be honest with myself about how I’m feeling. If I want to work through negative thoughts or emotions, I have to acknowledge that I have them before I can do anything about them. Occasionally I’ll get a negative vibe about a certain person or situation; ignoring that feeling has gotten me into trouble in the past, so now I pay attention whenever I feel that way. Even when it turns out to be nothing serious, being honest about how I’m feeling is still important.

The only times I think dishonesty may be justified are cases in which telling the truth will result in someone being tormented and lying gives them a chance to escape. For example, I consider those who hid persecuted people in their homes during WWII and then lied about it to SS officers to be heroes for saving lives even though they did it dishonestly. Outside of those situations, however, I see honesty as the only way to go. You may disagree with me about that or see it as contradictory to what I said above, and that’s perfectly fine, especially since it is contradictory. I’m just being honest about my thinking regarding telling the truth in life-or-death situations, and I hope I’m never in one of those situations. For all other areas of life, I think honesty is always the best policy. I hope that this has been useful in some way even if it’s simply interesting food for thought. I’d appreciate any feedback you have about this and I will see you in the next post.

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Exploring My Rules: Improve Every Day

Posted on January 24, 2019 by admin

For this third post about exploring my rules, I’m going to talk about the one that has been critical to my success, both with following these rules and with everything else in my life. Rule number three is simple and yields massive results: Improve every day.

I get better at whatever I regularly practice, even if it’s something I’d rather avoid (such as negative thinking, for example). For most of my life, I’ve practiced all sorts of things that have caused me trouble and given me a lot of bad habits. I’ve spent the last few years really working to change that and it’s been a slow, difficult process. However, I have seen progress since I started regularly practicing following my rules and focusing on positive things, so I know I’m on the right track. This progress has increased as I’ve gradually settled into routines and systems that have me working on self-improvement every day.

I don’t have to make monumental leaps in progress. As long as I stick with my system of doing the best I can on any given day at every activity on my list, I’ll see steady improvement and feel satisfied with my efforts. Sometimes I do see noticeable progress from one day to the next, other times it takes much longer, and in some cases I seem to take a few steps back before taking several giant steps forward. But as long as I stick with something long enough, I’ll eventually get good at it and I always see progress along the way.

Improving every day doesn’t require a huge amount of time. Even on my busiest days, I still have time for improving myself and getting better at my hobbies. Just spending a few minutes on those tasks is better than doing nothing because I don’t have as much time as I’d like.  I’ve found meditating, praying, and reading to be powerful tools for self-improvement, and I make sure to do them every day; when I don’t have time for much else, those still leave me better off than I’d be without them. Taking time to improve every day has brought me much closer to the place I want to be in life as well as the person I want to be, and I’ll only get closer to both of them as I continue. 

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Exploring My Rules: Seek First to Understand, Then to Be Understood

Posted on January 23, 2019 by admin

This is the second post in which I explore my rules in greater detail. The focus of this post will be one of the habits from Stephen Covey’s classic book The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Seek first to understand, then to be understood.

It’s so easy for me to make a case for one of my positions before I hear the other person’s side. Even when they go first, I have to make sure I’m actually listening to them instead of daydreaming or thinking about what I’m going to say. This brings up a related issue that Covey also talks about, which is listening with the intent to reply rather than the intent to understand. I often have to pause and remind myself of this, especially in conversations centered around sensitive subjects. When I do succeed in listening to what others have to say and making sure I understand it, I learn much more than when I try to force my ideas onto someone else.

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve jumped to conclusions about the way someone else thinks and have subsequently spoken wrongly about them or their position. This caused me a lot of embarrassment and eventually made me more hesitant to make assumptions about other people. When I’m engaged in a conversation, especially about something controversial, I try to make sure I know where the other person is coming from before responding. That helps me avoid attacking a straw man and often makes me see the other person in a better light when I realize how much we have in common. Additionally, I’ve found that people are more willing to hear my take on something once I’ve heard theirs. This doesn’t mean trying to rush them through their opinions so we can get to mine as quickly as possible; it means taking the time to let them explain their thought process and making sure I can accurately say it back to them in my own words. While this is useful for persuasive purposes, most of the time I do it simply because I want to know how they think or because I want the conversation to go smoothly, or both.

Each of the habits in The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People are rock solid and this one is no exception. Everyone wants to be heard and understood, so giving them time and space for both of those things is one of the greatest possible demonstrations of respect for them. So many conflicts based on misunderstandings could be avoided if more people took a page from the Book of James and listened before speaking. I’ve gotten a lot better at this over time and I’m still getting better as I continue to work on it. Since practicing this for a relatively short stretch of time has already significantly improved my life, I can’t wait to see how it looks after I’ve been doing it for many years.

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Exploring My Rules: The Golden Rule

Posted on January 22, 2019 by admin

I once made a post about the rules I do my best to live by. Lately, I’ve been thinking of different ways to apply them, some of which are not always readily apparent. So I decided to make a separate post about each rule and explore them individually. For this post, I’ll be focusing on the Golden Rule: “Do to others as you’d have them do to you.”

The Golden Rule has that name for a few good reasons. Firstly, although many people are familiar with it through the Bible, it also appears in several other religions. This suggests a deep universality and wisdom to the rule as it is not limited to just one worldview. Secondly, if everyone followed this rule, there’d be no more conflicts of any type and the world would be filled with peace. Even without going that far, if more people followed the Golden Rule than do now, there’d be much more peace and much less violence. Part of this is because following the rule requires thinking about other people and their feelings instead of solely focusing on oneself. This facilitates understanding which, in turn, opens the door to deeper and more meaningful interactions.

There are some cases in which it doesn’t work, such as self-defense scenarios, but it works perfectly far more often than not. Even if another rule proves to work better in a certain situation, the Golden Rule is still handy early on before the situation unfurls. This rule does so much good in so many different areas of life that, if I had to keep one of my rules and abandon the rest, this would be the one I’d keep. It also works well in conjunction with many other rules and often the combination of two or more of them is stronger than any one of them alone. For all these reasons (and probably many more that I haven’t even considered), the Golden Rule is incredibly powerful and offers much to anyone on either the giving or receiving end of it. I don’t always manage to follow it but when I do, it does me a world of good and paves the way for so much more, and that’s why it’s my first rule.

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Swing Ouch Clinic and Evening Dance

Posted on January 21, 2019 by admin

This past Saturday, Bold City Swing hosted its first workshop called the “Swing Ouch Clinic” in Jacksonville, Florida. Regional instructors Alex Morrison and Roxie Smith joined us at All About Ballroom and taught us a lot of great stuff. I was fortunate enough to attend and have a great time, so here are some of the highlights from that awesome day.

The workshop started a little after 11 am and ran until about 4 pm, with an hour break for lunch around 1 pm. Alex and Roxie covered a lot of swing dance fundamentals with the goal of improving our dancing and keeping everyone safe while doing some intense movements; additionally, they walked us through a number of exercises that gradually built up to a full swingout, hence the name of the workshop. Although the skill levels of the participants ranged from beginner to advanced, the workshop contained useful concepts for everyone to keep in mind and served as a great reminder for those who needed it (mostly me). For general swing dancing, I think it was the most helpful workshop I’ve attended and I feel like everything made more sense to me in this one than any other one.

An evening dance started a few hours after the workshop ended, running from 7 pm until 10 pm. Almost everyone who went to the workshop came back that night to dance, eat snacks, and have fun, and a few people came to the dance even though they didn’t go to the workshop. Alex and Roxie came back and were available to dance or help anyone who wanted to work on something from earlier in the day. After the dance ended, a few of us stuck around and reset everything until we were ready to leave for the night. I drove home feeling tired from all the dancing but also feeling great about how everything went. I’m looking forward to continue playing around with what I learned as well as attending the next Bold City Swing workshop. This one was a great start and a preview of many more wonderful things to come out of the Jacksonville swing dance scene.

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Showing Concern Without Going Overboard

Posted on January 20, 2019 by admin

As I’ve progressed in my self-improvement work, I’ve gradually revealed more of my personality to the people I meet, even if we only briefly cross paths. My shyness has drastically decreased as my confidence has steadily risen. Whenever I get exceptionally close to a friend, I typically remove the vast majority of my filters and show as much of who I am as possible, including showing my caring side to someone is going through a rough time. This is especially true with the people I consider to be my best friends. While this has generally gone over well, it can sometimes backfire and result in a lot of discomfort between me and someone else.

Most of the trouble I’ve had with this has either come from trying to show a great deal of concern before getting to know someone well enough or being too persistent with it even with someone I’ve known well for a good while. Several people I know have distanced themselves, mostly temporarily but permanently in a few cases, as a result of my going overboard. Fortunately, the permanent separations weren’t close friends, so there was little to no pain on my part from them. Still, they taught me an important lesson about knowing how to care for people and adjust the many elements that come with that process to match each person since what works for one person might not work for another.

Reading The 5 Love Languages has helped me a lot with this. If I know how someone prefers to receive love, then I can show them love and support in that way even if it differs from the way I prefer to receive it, which makes them more likely to appreciate and accept it. Also, knowing how much love to show is also important. When a customer at my job revealed a tragedy in his life, I gave him my sympathies and left it at that, which he seemed to appreciate. I’ve found that going above and beyond, especially with strangers, can do more harm than good. This can sometimes even be the case with friends, so I generally try to keep it short and to the point, stopping once I’ve let them know I care about them unless they signal that they want me to continue. I recently did this with a friend who experienced an unfortunate event and I think keeping it simple was just what that situation needed. I plan to continue helping people where I can, but I’m also going to keep working on doing it as effectively as possible. And I think I’m on the right track.

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Guided Meditation and Releasing Negative Energy

Posted on January 19, 2019 by admin

I have a hard time letting things go and tend to carry around thoughts and feelings long after the events that caused them. Although I’ve gotten better at letting go over time, I still have problems with it now and then. Something that’s helped me a lot with this is a guided healing meditation that a friend sent me.

The meditation starts off with deep breathing to put me into a relaxed state. After a few minutes of that, it instructs me to call in Archangel Michael and imagine what he looks like. The remainder of the meditation is then spent thinking about uncomfortable situations, guilt or regret over past actions, ill will toward others, negative energy, etc, and releasing them to the angels. This is a deeply relaxing thing to do and always leaves me feeling much lighter and freer after I’ve finished it. Since I usually do it on Wednesday nights right before bed, I think it also helps me sleep better on those nights as well.

Every time I’ve done that meditation, I’ve felt much better both on Wednesdays as well as for the next few days. I didn’t realize how much negative energy I was carrying until I started doing this. That negative energy affected my friendships, my job performance, and my overall quality of life. Releasing a bit of it each day via my normal self-improvement work and a lot of it each Wednesday through this healing meditation has done wonders for me. I think that’s what made the past few days so amazing for me. Despite having a headache for one of them, I felt much more comfortable during both days when I was interacting with other people than usual: I spoke easily and fluidly, didn’t feel shy or nervous around anyone, and, for the most part, didn’t let anything get to me. I can’t think of any other recent event in my life that could have taken away my anxiety and smoothed out my interactions with others, so I think this is what did it. If you’ve never tried a guided meditation, I’d highly recommend it. And if you do, I hope it helps you as much as it helps me.

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The Power of Listening

Posted on January 18, 2019 by admin

I try to solve problems wherever possible. Much of the progress I’ve made at self-improvement and other skills has come from figuring out my weak points and then fixing them. Further, when I talk to someone about a difficult time I’m having, I often ask for advice on getting out of the situation or holding on until it’s over. This problem-solving mindset is why I tend to offer potential solutions for issues other people mention to me. However, this doesn’t always go over well.

I’ve had to learn when to be a problem-solver and when to be a listener. Stephen Covey and Dale Carnegie talk a lot about the importance of listening in The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People and How to Win Friends and Influence People, respectively. Both books have helped me become a better listener and tune into what the other person needs. Sometimes a person in a weird situation just needs someone to hear their ideas so they can make a decision or solve a problem on their own. Other times listening might not help them solve their problem, but it will let them know I care and that I’m there for them. Focusing primarily on solving the problem, however, may make it seem like I care more about the problem than I care about the person, and that can create a lot of strife between us. So in some cases, the best thing to do is just listen to and hold space for the other person as they talk their way through their feelings or a solution to their problem.

It wasn’t until I noticed my own occasional tendency to seek out a listener that I realized how powerful it is to truly listen to someone without judgment or trying to figure everything out for them. Some of my greatest breakthroughs have come from just having someone listen as I ramble on and inadvertently say something insightful. Now that I’m aware of this, I try to keep that in mind when listening to others; sometimes I’ll even ask if they want me to give them advice or listen. Sometimes, after having listened to someone talk through their feelings on multiple occasions, they’ll ask me for advice without my ever offering it, which I take as a sign that they trust me, respect me, and value my input. I doubt I would get that request much, if at all, if I always focused on solving problems instead of caring for the other person. This is what I’ve discovered thus far from becoming a better listener and I’m excited to see what else I learn along the way.

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Comfort Zone

Posted on January 17, 2019 by admin

There’s a saying that “life happens outside your comfort zone”. Since I’ve spent a good bit of my life both in and out of my comfort zone at various times, I have to say I agree with that saying. I’ve steadily moved outside my comfort zone in a number of ways, most of which I think will be permanent rather than just temporary as they’ve often been in the past.

As with many changes I’ve made in the past few years, I’ve gradually taken steps out of my comfort zone and into uncharted territory (uncharted for me, at least). I’ve benefited a lot from making small changes and winning small victories that over time have resulted in big successes. The changes have been big enough that I can see a difference but small enough to allow me time to adjust without feeling overwhelmed; this has been critical to my success as I have quit many things in the past because I took on more than I could handle and got burnt out. Keeping the changes manageable has allowed me to gradually progress and level up in ways I previously never thought possible.

Although I think it’s important to step outside your comfort zone, I also think that the comfort zone has value and should be visited once in a while. Sometimes returning to something that’s familiar and soothing can be useful for resuming your regular routine after returning from big adventures, or perhaps just recovering from the stresses of daily life and sharpening the saw. Also, because there’s a great deal of familiarity in your comfort zone, you might find something in it that can be useful when learning something new. Personally, I have found returning to my comfort zone useful both for sharpening the saw and learning new things, so I make regular visits to it for those purposes.

I could fill a whole blog post with all the things I’ve done by stepping outside my comfort zone and how those things have benefited me. Many of them, such as taking a road trip halfway across the country a few years ago, taught me important lessons even if I didn’t appreciate the lessons or the way I learned them at the time. Others, like my trip to Classic City Swing 7 last year, were pure joy from beginning to end. From organizing several events to vastly improving my communication and socialization skills to many other things that I can’t even recall at the moment, my life is much different and much better now for stepping into the unknown and trying a lot of new things. The comfort zone is good for occasional visits, but don’t stay there too long or you’ll miss out on all the amazing things life has to offer.

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A Poem for Sawyer

Posted on January 16, 2019 by admin

It’s hard to remember a time without you

I got you when you were a puppy of two

Time has gone by and made you old

But you’re still enthusiastic and bold

You love to play and you love to nap

When you want some attention, you give me a tap

To sit at the window is a favorite task

Barking as people and critters walk past

You miss me so much whenever I roam

And greet me so warmly when I come home

You make the good times a bit more glad

And the hard times a little less sad

Although I have many things I must do

I still take the time to play with you

When I could be doing something else instead

I sit down with you and pet your head

Because it won’t always be that way

And I know I’ll say goodbye someday

You’re the best dog I could have asked for

And I’m grateful you’re there for me to adore

I love you and thank you for being my friend

I just hope I’ll be strong when it comes to an end

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