Women Issues

According to Dr. Robert S. Elliot, stress may be the greatest single contributor to illness in the industrial world. In his book, Is It Worth Dying For?, he offers the following tests that help you understand your own feelings so that you can “live creatively” with stress.

The Tombstone Test

Clarifying one’s own values is essential to managing stress. To clarify your values ask yourself: “What would you like to have written on your tombstone? How would you like to be remembered? This question has a way of crystallizing personal values.

The Checkbook Test

Get your checkbook and make a list of where you have chosen to spend your money in the past twelve months. Take a close look at your discretionary expenses (other than your fixed expenses like rent, food, ..). many people never find the money to buy what they really want because they spend it on things they want less.

The Time Test

Make a list of all the things you do in a normal month, plus what you do on special occasions. Such a list has helped a man who was spending three hours a day on a crowded train to a city job to request a transfer to the suburb. The list helped him realize that an activity he assumed was necessary had nothing to do with what he really wanted from life.

The Pride Test

What personal accomplishments give you the most pride? Can the life you are living today provide more accomplishments like these?

The Adjective Test

What three qualities would you most like to see associated with your reputation? Is the life you are living today distinguished by these qualities?

The “Six-Month-to Live” Test

Suppose you only had six months to live. What would you choose to do, and not to do, in that time? Based on your answer, what changes would you do in your life now?

Here’s how to say no to unreasonable requests:

1. Be fast: Make your answers known right up front. Don’t hesitate, wait, or think about it. This way you don’t allow people to anticipate that you may say yes. This will make accepting your “no” much easier. Answers like. ”Let me think about it” or “I am not sure” only make things more difficult for they get people’s hopes up. A fast “no” will most likely leave you “still friends.” A delayed no increases the chances of animosity.
2. Be confident: Don’t say “no” in a half-hearted apologetic way. This conveys to the other party the feeling that you have no good reason for saying “no.” Remember: You have the right to say no.
3. Be Polite: Being firm does not mean you have to be rude. Use firm words but in a pleasant style and demeanor.
4. Be helpful: If you can offer an alternative way to satisfy the person’s needs that doesn’t involve you, go ahead and suggest it.

Understand others and conquer yourself:

“To understand others is to be knowledgeable;
“To understand yourself is to be wise.
“To conquer others is to have strength;
“To conquer yourself is to be strong.”
- Lao Tzu

A wise man surrounded by his followers had a jar in front of him and he started to fill it with rocks. When it looked like the jar was full, he asked the people surrounding him if they agree that it was full. They did. He then took small pebbles and started to add them to the jar’s content, shaking it frequently until the jar looked full again. Again he asked his followers if the jar was full, and they agreed.

The wise man took some sand and started to pour it in the same jar to fill the space that was left between the rocks and the pebbles until it looked like the jar can take no more. When he asked again if the jar was full, the followers agreed.

Then the wise man produced another jar and filled it with sand. When he tried to add pebbles and rocks, he couldn’t because the sand filled the whole jar leaving no space in between. One of his followers asked the wise man about the meaning of all this. The wise man said.

“This jar represents your life. The rocks are the most important things - your mental state, your health, your family – things that if all else was lost and only they remained, your life will still be full. The pebbles represent other things that matter like your job, your house, your car, your savings. The sand represents everything else - the small stuff.”

“When the jar was filled with sand first, there was no room for the rocks or the pebbles.
The same thing goes for your life. If you worry about the small stuff, you won’t have room for the things that matter most.” 

"Take care of the rocks first -- the things that really matter. Set your priorities. The rest is just sand."

“The first step in achieving your goals is to recognize that “someday” is not a day of the week.”
- Ed Bliss

“The only person over whom you have direct and immediate control is yourself. The most important assets to develop, preserve, and enhance, therefore, are your own capabilities.”
- Stephen R. Covey

Most likely, you do remember when your body was last stimulated and excited. But do you remember when your mind was?

Get a pen or a pencil and write down:
The last time I came up with an innovative idea at work was.

• Yesterday
• Last month
• Last week
• Last year

The result of that idea was  ______________________________________________

But how to come up with new ideas?

Most of the research done in creativity indicates that the main road that can lead to new ideas is “the road less traveled by,” if we can borrow Walt Whitman’s phrase.
You will find new ideas when you break out of the familiar molds, the regular ways of doing business, and venture into unchartered waters and unknown territories.

Let’s do some simple stimulating exercises:
On a piece of paper write down the various ways things are closed.

1. ……..
2. ……..
3. ……..
4. ……..
5. ……..
6. ……..
7. ……..

Now compare your list to the one below:

• A country has a closed door policy
• In accounting – the books are closed
• The door is closed
• The matter is closed
• The road is closed
• A person closed his mouth, eyes..
• Can the car self-close?
  

- How about considering some of the following:

• Why do mirrors reverse images from left to right but not top to bottom?
• What would happen if animals became more intelligent than people? For example, for whom would you be working now?
• Would it be better or worse if people had eyes in the back of their heads to see what’s happening behind their backs?
  
  

These are not trivial, irrelevant, or far-out questions. For example, thinking about the last one, we find that when cars were designed, mirrors were installed inside and outside to enable the driver to see  backwards. Why don’t we do the same thing for the pedestrian?

Here’s a million-dollar idea. Just find a venture capitalist to lend you the money, and you’ll be a millionaire. The idea is:
Make eyeglasses that have small mirrors on the side so that by wearing them we can see ahead or what is behind us.
Take this idea and fly with it. Will it sell?

The point is, in just a few moments we spent since we started getting into the creative mood at the beginning of this article, we ended up inventing a new product. You can see where the creative mood can lead you.

Now write down:

What are the many ways I can improve things in my work? In the department? In the organization?

Initiate!

“Advancement is applied initiative. Don’t imitate. Initiate.”
- B. C. Forbes

“ No one can possibly achieve any real and lasting success or get rich in business by being a conformist.”
- Jean Paul Getty

“Sometimes the seeds of happiness are sown in darkness.”
- Unknown

“Happiness is not a state to arrive at, but a manner of traveling.”
- Margaret Lee Runbeck

“The purpose of life is not to be happy. The purpose of life is to matter, to be productive, to have it make some difference that you lived at all.”
- Arthur H. Prince

“Happiness grows at our own firesides, and is not to be picked in strangers' gardens.”
- Douglas Jerrould

“Happiness is a thing to be practiced, like the violin.”
- John Lubbock

“Happiness is the delicate balance between what one is and what one has."
- F. H. Denison

“In the pursuit of happiness, the difficulty lies in knowing when you have caught up.”
- R.H. Grenville

“The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain.”
- Kahlil Gibran

“The supreme happiness of life is the conviction of being loved for yourself, or, more correctly, being loved in spite of yourself.”
- Victor Hugo

It was like this every few years after a storm, for hundred thousand storms. The storm would be frightening. Everything would look different for a while. But the beach would always come back, bringing more fish than before.

All of the living things of the island understood and accepted. Until the humans came.

You might want to reproduce and distribute this article in your next department meeting or team session, and discuss the following questions:

• What does this metaphor tell you about change?
• How does it relate to your workplace?
• What do you think is the most effective way to relate to change?