Tag: life

  • The true responsibility of life is Self-Love

    Responsibility. For a long time, that was a dirty word to me. It sounded like obligation, duty, bondage. Heavy. To be avoided.

    Maybe I overstate my case. For certainly, if I avoided all responsibility, I couldn’t have built the things I did, including a lab at a University and then a business that has survived somehow for 16 years.

    Yet, when I consider that word, there has always been a part of me that said “No thanks, that’s not me.” Or maybe it was just a part of me that internalized the voices of various adults in my life, who said: “be more responsible! Clean up your room! Do your homework! Stop taking apart radios and playing with your animals”. (true fact: for most of my life up until high school, I always had some kind of reptile or fish in an aquarium. Turtles were my favorites.)

    That internalized voice made our responsibility to be something that was averse to what I actually wanted. I’ve figured out since then that I love learning, only I never loved the type of learning that came with words like “homework” – especially when it was someone else telling me to do those things.

    Because I wasn’t particularly good at listening, always having a bit of a stubborn streak, I got the label of “irresponsible.”

    The outside label became an inside label. Given that label, it was hard to feel any kinship to the word “responsibility.”

    Yet the weird thing is, as I approach six decades of life, the word is becoming important to me. It turns out I had some of it all along. But it was a different thing than I learned from adults.

    The “responsibility” I learned growing up was basically the idea of satisfying other people’s desires, fears, and expectations.

    For example, let’s take cleaning up my room. Now, since it was my room, all the way at the end of the house, and nobody came in there except to figure out if it was messy and tell me to clean it up, it seems a bit ridiculous to think that if the mess wasn’t bothering me, why did I need to be “responsible” to clean it up? Why was it “irresponsible” to not clean it up?

    Some adults clearly thought they were “teaching me something.” Yet what they did is messed with my head, like one big psy-op. Because they produced exactly the opposite effect of the one they intended.

    Years of self-observation have led me to notice that I like it better when my environment isn’t too messy. Yet I wasn’t allowed to discover that for myself early on, because I was too beholden to the “adults in the room” and what they thought was right, true, and important for me.

    This form of responsibility is one that is imposed. So the question I’ve considered is this: is imposed responsibility really responsibility? Or is it something else, a sort of echo of responsibility, like a diminutive form with less power and more heaviness?

    If there is this “diminutive form of responsibility”, like the minor chord to a major, then what is the true form of responsibility all about?

    The animals I mentioned earlier may have a role in clarifying this.

    I was only a so-so caretaker of the turtles, the lizards, and the fish. I loved watching them, I was intrigued by them, and I truly felt care for them. And yet, school, friends, and other demands had me scattered. Sometimes, the poor animals would be neglected, and didn’t survive very long. So off I went to get another one.

    I have had literal nightmares in my adult years of finding dead animals, and realizing the horror of my neglect. Obviously this thing that I could so easily overlook when I was young had an effect on me – a very long lasting effect. It amplified the sense I had taken on, from those adults, that I was irresponsible.

    Perhaps this points at the difference: I have never had a bad dream about an unkempt room. Never one regret. When it got too messy, I’d clean it up and feel better—no adult prodding needed. But my absence of care for those animals—ones I’d taken from the wild, caged, then neglected—that is haunting.

    It kind of amazes me that the adults in my life let me do that. Despite that they wanted me to “be more responsible” – on this thing that actually mattered, they didn’t do much to help me actually be more responsible (by saying a thing like: no, you can’t get another turtle if you don’t truly take care of this one, aka a turtle moratorium).

    Why does my neglect – my irresponsibility – towards the animals seem so different than my so called irresponsibility towards keeping my room clean?

    One has love and care for another being involved. The other does not.

    The animals illustrate this important nuance far better than a human could. The animals I neglected weren’t able to talk back. They couldn’t argue. They couldn’t divorce me, berate me, or blame me. They would never tell me “you’re being irresponsible.”

    They just were. I either cared for them, or didn’t. And the results of that choice carried on with me for years.

    It points to a nuance that is very difficult to get as a 3D human, yet it affects us at so many levels. It is that loving responsibility towards others is loving responsibility to the self, along with its inverse: loving responsibility towards self expresses as loving responsibility towards others.

    This is a weird nuance in our otherwise polarized world. We’re used to thinking of “us versus them” or “this versus that.” Most things in our world operate that way.

    But love, as the ultimate energy of creation, does not behave by the same rules. It does not separate subject from object. Its only polarity is that it’s either present or it’s not as present. (Is it ever truly absent? That’s worth another contemplation)

    So, in my lack of responsibility and love for the animals I held, there was also a lack of responsibility and love for myself. I was experiencing less flow of love because I wasn’t doing it for the animals, and I wasn’t doing it for myself, which meant I couldn’t do it for the animals. If that sounds circular, it is. Love for self is love for others. Love for others is love for self. They aren’t separate streams. They’re the same whole.

    Now I feel like I just opened a honey jar next to an ant nest. So let’s focus it back into the subject at hand: responsibility. It would seem that maybe responsibility and love are connected.

    More specifically, it appears that the fullest form of responsibility is an expression of love, for both self and others. It is a responsibility to see “I” and “them” in the highest regard, in the purest light, and to act upon that as needed physically.

    This has startling implications. For it says that if what we’re doing is not from self-love, it isn’t really other-love, either.

    Can that be true? Or have I just painted myself into a corner of words?

    One thing I have clearly observed: if someone doesn’t have much self-love, they are far more likely to neglect those they might care for. I.e. the absent parent, or alcoholic parent/workaholic parent: those patterns of behavior, at the deepest level, stem from a lack of deeper self-love, expressed as the lack of self-care. That lack of self-care, which is a core responsibility of any human on the planet, then overflows into the lack of other care.

    Maybe we are onto something then, and perhaps that something can illuminate this issue of responsibility, in its more diminutive form versus its fuller form.

    It seems that we can divide those forms along the lay lines of love.

    Diminutive responsibility is a thing we feel we must do for others—to avoid their disappointment, or to generate approval, to be seen as responsible, to be liked. In other words, this form of responsibility is performative. It’s a transaction. We perform the behavior to manage someone else’s emotional response, not because it flows from self-love.

    It is putting on a show so we don’t get punished (the stick) and/or we get a reward (the carrot), but not inherently as an expression of self love (which is also other-love).

    Then the fuller, richer form of responsibility is that which is done not performatively, but starts with care and love for the self, expressed as responsibility to the self: to take care of our needs for rest, for time, for space, taking care of our bodies, our focus, our centeredness. When we do these kinds of responsibilities, the love in that, because it’s not performatively, flows over to others we care about. We become a positive force because we are embodying love, starting with ourselves.

    (Author’s note: Some people hear “self-love” and think narcissism. That’s an inversion. A narcissist lacks self-love, so they perform to extract validation from others—a desperate attempt to fill the void. True self-love doesn’t demand external approval. It flows. A truly self-loving person cannot be a narcissist. Love transcends ego.)

    So this kind of responsibility is the much more difficult one to embody in today’s world. I’ve asked myself many times why this is so difficult.

    The short answer: this true and full responsibility—the embodiment of self-love flowing into other-love—is what our whole system of operation is designed to separate us from.

    We are trained to perform for others, not self love.

    We are taught to outsource our self care, to the “professionals” who know what’s best

    We think of responsibility in terms like I did when I was younger, that being “irresponsible” is letting down someone else who doesn’t like what we’re doing, rather than being responsible to our own selves and our inner well-being first and foremost.

    Most of all, most of us are trained with a deep sense of guilt and even shame if we stray from the path of being performatively responsible.

    Those guilts and shames stick in our system, controlling many of us from birth to death, programming us to do the things that others want us to do in the name of so-called “responsibility.”

    If my parents had taught me to tune into my own feelings about those poor caged animals I collected, to understand what this was doing to my sense of self love and self worth in neglecting them, I would have advanced much more quickly in my true responsibility than I did with being berated about a messy room.

    But, after almost six decades of life, I’m finally getting it. By sharing this with you, I hope it will help you on a journey to getting it much sooner than I did.

    What’s your experience of responsibility toward yourself—those expressions of self-love? Can you take a vacation just because you need it, without guilt or shame, even if others might judge you? Or do you feel that familiar pang—the one that says you’re being selfish, irresponsible, letting someone down?

    If you feel it, you’re not alone. And you’re not broken. You’re just operating inside an architecture that conditioned you to perform responsibility instead of embody it.

  • Top-10 Beliefs That Are Ruining Your Life

    Top-10 Beliefs That Are Ruining Your Life

    Wait a sec. How can a belief ruin your life? It’s just a measly little set of biochemical connections in your mind, no way can it have that kind of impact…. right!?

    What if you believed that all water is toxic? If you truly believed this, deep-down, you’d avoid all sources of water… and soon, you’d die. It’s not the water that is toxic, it’s the belief.

    All beliefs are that way. Most of us are comfortable in our beliefs because we’ve surrounded ourselves with other people who hold similar ones. That helps us feel “safe,” because most of us have a herd-like evolutionary (unconscious) belief of “safety in numbers.”

    But being part of a herd doesn’t mean that our beliefs are supporting our progress towards things that matter. Whether the things you want are better work-life balance, more recognition, more money or funding, or whatever – it is most likely your own (toxic) beliefs that hold you back from having those things.

    1. I’m nobody important, and I’m not sure why they gave me this position/accolade/promotion! In a world of over 7 billion people, it’s sometimes hard to feel important – and that means it’s much harder to achieve anything big. When we’re younger, most of us have our parents filling the role of seeing us as important. Then there’s a transition to adulthood, and most of us never replace the parental role with our own inner sense of importance. Believing in your own unimportance leads to self-sabotaging behaviors that will slow or halt progress towards things that you care about.
    2. There’s never enough time to get it all done This time-scarcity belief causes its holders to rush around, always hurrying, cramming and jamming into every possible moment every possible action until exhaustion comes. Yet, if you’re trying to achieve a new situation or goal, that doesn’t come from frenzied activity and lack of sleep. No, the source of change is always clarity, and clarity generally only comes easily to a rested and relaxed mind. A single action made in clarity can be as effective as 100 actions taken without clarity. Stop. Breath. Get clarity, then act.
    3. It’s a dangerous world out there Fear is a paralyzing feeling. How much can you accomplish towards your goals when you’re paralyzed? (hint: none). The more you believe in the world being a dangerous place due to politics, violence, environmental destruction, or whatever, it’s the belief in danger that will hold you back from making things happen.
    4. I’m better/smarter/wiser than my colleagues When you get a rejection, it’s easy to start pointing fingers at “stupid” colleagues that “don’t get it.” Yet that ego-driven attitude also subtly places you in the role of victim and pawn to “them.” This is a disempowering belief, because it prevents you from seeing the blind spots in you where improvement may be needed to get the results you want. Humility is essential to self-improvement, and ego gets in the way.
    5. There’s never enough money or funding to go around This belief in money scarcity reproduces itself in your life when you carry it around. Just look at the facts: there are trillions of dollars and other currencies flowing around the world. Some people (including some of your colleagues) are better at diverting a bigger portion of that flow (both in And out). However, if you’re caught in scarcity, you’re often focused on tightening down the outflow. Think about this: what happens when you turn a faucet — which regulates outflow — to a trickle? You get a trickle of an IN flow. Now, let’s say your faucet is wide open but the flow isn’t very good. It requires a totally different set of mental and physical tools to increase the inflow than it does to reduce outflow. However, if you have a belief that the in-flow is scarce, your focus will be mainly on limiting out-flow, and you’ll be forever caught in a loop of limitation.
    6. Great work speaks for itself There’s this belief amongst idealists that if you do some great work – whether it’s a scientific breakthrough, a new invention, a novel, or whatever – that you’ll get recognized for it. While it is true that some people do get recognized for such greatness posthumously, the question is whether you want to wait until you’re dead to get the rewards for your work. If you’d rather have some of those rewards here and now, then a belief that “Great work speaks for itself” is toxic. It is exceedingly rare that “great work” alone is enough to speak for itself. No, great work must have an effective spokesperson to get it out into the world, and that spokesperson is always one and the same as the originator of the work. (Unless you happen to be a billionare, and can hire a full-time PR team). It is only by embracing the idea that you are responsible for “marketing” your work to the world, and learning how to do it more effectively, that your cure/invention/idea/novel/etc is likely to get into the hands of other people where it can have its intended impact – and bring you recognition/money/reward as a result.
    7. It’s dangerous to be “vulnerable” with my colleagues Many people are extremely guarded around their colleagues, because they believe if they show any “weakness” it will be exploited by hostiles. However, research by Dr. BrenĂŠ Brown and colleagues has clearly shown that it is psychologically unhealthy to exist in a closed-in cocoon of guardedness. It prevents us from making deep and meaningful connections with people in our lives, and it also prevent us from acting boldly. Doing anything great requires “putting yourself out there” and being willing to be criticized. If you’re locked in a guarded shell, you’ll be unable to make the bold leaps that are required to accomplish anything truly great. This means being forever locked in a cycle of mediocrity. Vulnerability is essential to great accomplishment.
    8. I have to do exactly as my boss/chair/dean/supervisor says in order to succeed If you work at a big-chain-fast-food-joint, then perhaps it’s essential for you to do exactly as people above you say. But when you’re in a position that requires leadership – such as being a faculty member or entrepreneur – you must be willing to follow your inner drive and your own vision, even if it means going in a different direction than someone else thinks you should. Often well-meaning advisors/mentors/bosses tell us things such as “you must apply for more grants.” Many of us try to be people pleasers and therefore to follow such advice. However, at the end of the day, leadership is one of the most essential attributes we must develop, and leadership always means listening to your own inner authority first and foremost. This doesn’t mean ignoring input from others, but it does mean that as a leader you make your own decisions and take full responsibility for them.
    9. I’m struggling because the system is messed up The system may well be messed up but this is never why any individual is struggling. Even in terrible systems or bad economies, there are always people who do well. It is tempting to believe that that’s due to luck, but it rarely is. Instead, it’s due to a spirit of entrepreneurialism, creativity, and fearlessness. While TV and movies would have you believe that its only the greedy, power-monging manipulators who succeed in rough environments, the reality is quite different. The Great Depression produced a large crop of millionaires, many of whom made their fortunes by ignoring the “depressive” sentiment of their time to act boldly in starting new businesses. The choice of whether you thrive or not has everything to do with your own attributes of entrepreneurialism and creativity, and very little to do with the external environment around you.
    10. I’m just a meaningless blip in a vast, cold, universe Humans thrive on meaning and purpose. All great works throughout human history have resulted from people who felt driven by some bigger purpose. So, if you believe that the universe is a hard, cold, meaningless place, that belief will stand like a big cement wall smack dab in your path to achieving important things. It doesn’t matter whether you believe that there’s something bigger/deeper than the material world we see or not, but if you lack purpose and meaning you will be ineffective and mediocre. So, getting rid of this belief and finding your own personal sense of meaning, purpose, and even wonder is like rocket fuel for great accomplishment.
    11. That all top-10 lists should only have 10 items I included this one just to show you the power of your own belief… and to demonstrate the automatic cognitive dissonance that occurs when a belief is violated. I also included it a a tribute to the movie Spinal Tap 😉

    There are plenty more where those come from, but if you found resonance in one or more of these, going to work on them will yield a tremendous bounty in your life.

     

     

  • Is your life ruled by "Lizard Brain?"

    Is your life ruled by "Lizard Brain?"

    Chances are, it is.

    If you have difficulty making tough decisions…

    If you have far too much on your plate and not enough time for it all…

    If you suffer from procrastination or perfectionism…

    If you like to wait until money is assured BEFORE you invest in yourself….

    If you regularly listen to the news and react with anger/frustration/fear…..

    These are signs that your LIMBIC system has control. The limbic brain came from our reptilian ancestors… eat, have sex, and run away from danger. That’s about it. It’s pretty good for those things… if that’s all you think your life should amount to, then keep on doing just that.

    And here’s where it will lead to:

    * As an entrepreneur, you’ll go from one marketing/sales program to the next, looking for the “magic bullet” that saves your hide. But somehow the hide-saving never quite happens. Meanwhile, you never seem to overcome those “hurdles” that keep rearing their ugly head each time… as you overwork yourself to the point of being ready to go back to a day job.

    * As a researcher, you will be scratching and clawing to get that next grant. You’ll procrastinate and perfect, spending nearly all your time on the small stuff, never finding the time for the big stuff that would move your life and career forward. You’ll know you’re capable of SO MUCH MORE and you scratch your head, wondering why you never seem to quite BE the SO MUCH MORE that you are.

    This lizard brain is very tricky… it not only keeps us shrinking back in fear from taking the big leaps that will truly make a difference… but it ALSO keeps us chasing after one “holy grail” after another to keep us entertained … just one more launch, just one more grant, just one more XXXYYYZZZ until salvation! Yay!

    As long as you are ruled by the FEAR (well disguised so that your ego doesn’t have to admit that you’re afraid – “who, me? I’m NOT AFRAID!”)… and as long as you are ruled by the chase-the-next-easy-out… your life, your business, your career will go NOWHERE.

    I can say that with confidence because I have previously let the fear infect me… I have let the lizard brain take over. Too many times. Each time I have gone backwards on money, relationships, and health. It was only by taking charge again (and getting good help) that I regained control.

    The only way to leave the lizard brain behind is connecting with your higher self. Scientifically that is your neocortex. Spiritually that is your core, or your “soul.” Operating from that place is THE OPPOSITE of being ruled by lizard-brain. It’s chill, it’s abundant, it’s fun, it’s easy.

    Beware lizard brain: it’s a big investment. And because this is what you might NEED, rather than being another easy little shiny-object or delaying tactic, you are probably firing full out right now. Red light. Red light. Scary. Let’s click onto the next post, or go get a coffee and procrastinate… again! Tomorrow will be better, or maybe the next day, or the day after that. Yes. That’s the easy way out. Lizard likes EASY. Yay!

    Well, if your higher self is watching all of that lizard brain stuff, and ready to actually TAKE CHARGE and do something about becoming the BEST person you can be (which will ONLY happen when you learn new habits to operate from the HIGHER SELF), then reach out to me. Like I said, one spot – that’s it for now.

  • I GIVE IN!!!

    It’s time I come clean, put my BS aside and take responsibility for my truest, most raw BEING.
    Why?
    To serve & honour myself…YES! And just as important, to lead by example.
    To inspire & facilitate your most extraordinary evolution through my deeds NOT JUST THROUGH MY WORDS.
    And to bestow on you, what you are worthy of….choice.
    See…
    For years I’ve been focused on bringing you things like grant writing and productivity because that’s what my ego thought you wanted.
    Did you ever notice that your ego creates many illusions? Mine certainly does.
    One of the illusions it created is this: “my story isn’t important.” I had a false sense of modesty, thinking that “I’m not interesting, let’s not talk about me…”
    And yet…
    Every time I’ve told my story of transformation (several of them!) and of ultimately “finding myself” I’ve had far more requests for help than at any other time. It has inspired people to grow and change, because my story shows that it’s possible despite great obstacles.
    So I finally had a “duh” moment the other day. People have been craving this for a reason:
    Our society is set up from day one to program us to NOT be ourselves, but to live for other people’s impressions of us.
    Our ego gets addicted to the positive feedback that others give us when we do things that are pleasing to THEM, and we un-learn how to just be ourselves.
    Yet being ourselves is THE platform for truly inspired creativity. Lots of people claim “I’m not creative” which is total BS. The lack of creativity is simply a lack of being tuned into “being oneself.” This goes on to impact all other areas of life, limiting career progress and satisfaction.
    Being disconnected from who you are, and living from ego gratification, presents challenges to deep, satisfying relationships. It presents challenges to being truly healthy. 
    Who you are is a wonderful, loving, beautiful, fun, unique being.
    Who you’ve been programmed to act as is quite likely competitive, skeptical, reserved… constantly having to “prove yourself” to others around you in order to feel worthy.
    This way of being leads to things like the “impostor syndrome.” If you’re not being you – but operating out of your ego’s notion of what you think others want from you – you’re going to feel like an impostor! Operating from this false platform will never lead to truly good things in life.
    People who’ve achieved so-called success in that way always end up self-sabotaging at some point. Like the guy I just heard about from a friend who was wealthy, until a particular self-sabotaging behavior (coming from Ego) sunk the whole ship, and now he’s destitute.
    Yep, that was me, for many years of my life. And it continued even after I had the sex change. One surgery didn’t suddenly resolve this disconnection I had from myself. (Oh I wish it were that easy!!) It took far more work than that.
    I had PLENTY of self-sabotage going on, despite my apparent successes that my ego has been able to brag about (like the track record of grant funding and business growth).
    So anyway….
    I give in! I give up on my own illusions that my story is unimportant and uninspiring. I give up on the notion that people need help with grants and productivity and creativity… when if I’d been listening, I would have heard the message loud and clear:
    “Morgan, help us learn how to powerfully express who we truly are in the world, with no illusions, games, or false fronts!”
    And in doing that, I strongly suspect that the “troubles” with grants, with sales, with relationships, with health, with employees, with feeling like an impostor… those things will start resolving themselves. (EVERY big breakthrough in these areas I’ve had has been directly correlated with work I’ve done on aligning with core.)
    Honestly, it’s a bit weird to do this. It seems too “easy” – but that’s only because I’ve spent years and some major ups and downs learning how to do just that. Learning how to finally be myself! So I’ll see how it goes….
    And, if you’re ready to go to work on this – to remove those layers of falsity that keep you from expressing who you are in the world – then reach out to me. I can help.
    Morgan

  • Victimhood vs Vulnerability

    Being authentic in vulnerability vs. the hidden agenda of victimhood.

     

  • The Sniffles or a Lesson?

    Getting sick can teach us something? Heck yeah!

     

  • "Panic Culture" and Ebola

    Airborne

    I had the “pleasure” – if you can call it that – of traveling through one of America’s busiest airports today. On my way through, there were headlines and TV’s blaring: “EBOLA!!!” 

    Scare. Fear. Worry. Doubt.

    “It could strike you at any time, so be AWARE, be CAREFUL, be SAFE.”

    Now, look. I have done a lot of computer modeling using fancy-sounding things like “Agent-based modeling.” I’ve played with the simulations of disease spread. It used to strike fear in me.

    If you believe like I did that something like Ebola can strike you down at any random time, then you are screwed. If not this virus, then the next, or the one after that. Or heart attack. Or cancer. Or meteor. Or war. Or murder. You’ll find a way.

    There are MANY ways to die, and a lot of people spend their entire lives, not LIVING, but AVOIDING DEATH. That’s so silly, because you can’t avoid the inevitable.

    No Regrets

    And yes, I’m going to die someday. Maybe soon, maybe later. Would I prefer the “later” scenario? Sure – but only because I feel like I have unfinished business, like raising kids and getting some more positive messages out into the world through the work that I do. I also want to explore some places I haven’t seen before. Yet, if it happens today, or tomorrow, I feel that I’ve lived life FULLY so far. I’ve done in one lifetime what few people do – experiencing life as a student, a teacher, a scientist, an entrepreneur, an explorer, an author, a man, a woman.

    And IF it happens soon, I don’t give any credence to the idea that it’s just “random.” If that happens, it means that I’ve accomplished what I came into this body and this life to accomplish, and it’s time to move on. There is nothing WRONG or SCARY about that.

    Led by Fear or Leading by CORE

    One of the principles of our universe – and our lives – is that you get what you focus on.

    So, if you’re constantly tuned into the news that is screaming EBOLA or disaster – you’re constantly tuned into fear. Since you get what you focus on, you’re going to get more FEAR in your life – i.e. an ever-accumulating pile of things in life to worry over, all adding up to the BIG ONE, the FINAL thing that you worried about but couldn’t ever fully prepare for (because you were so afraid to think that you might be snubbed out so handily by “circumstances” that you pretended you weren’t thinking about it – but you were).

    I’m not talking about sticking your head in the sand. You can be aware of your goals (such as “I’ve got more to do here”) and act in accordance with those goals (such as “I should wash my hands and avoid dangerous situations where possible.”) But it’s easy to go over the top with this, and lose connection with your CORE – your intuitive guidance system that can HELP you accomplish your goals. If your goal is to live longer, that guidance system is far more powerful than any screaming alert sirens or flashing headlines. It will help you line up with the people, places, and things that help you accomplish your goals.

    Auto-pilot vs Taking the Controls

    What screws most of us up in that is that we get lost in doubt, worry, and fear. Those things disconnect us from that very guidance system – much like an airliner that has just been flipped off of autopilot into manual flight mode. Manual flight is ok, but has a few challenges: it is tiring because it requires constant vigilance – and it requires VERY good instruments. Especially in our extremely complex world, operating on “manual” will tie you in logical knots about what is right, safe, and correct versus what is wrong and unsafe. Our “rational” minds cannot deal with a complex future, so we end up making these “rational” decisions with heuristics – i.e. shortcuts.  One of the most common heuristics is: “everyone is doing it, so that must be the way to do it.” Talk about a dangerous way to run your life. It’s like an airiner on manual pilot flying through fog. There are many illusions and without very good instruments, an “incident” is quite likely. Good instruments are like your CORE guidance system – yet most of us ignore those.

    An intuitive signal from the CORE is powerful. A heuristic is weak. They are NOT the same. Listening to heuristics leads to those random bad things (and some good things, too). Listening to the CORE helps you stay on track to what you want – as long as you’re clear about it and you don’t contradict it with the worry, doubt, and fear.

    Do not succumb to the fear mongers. Yes – be aware – but more important is to stay in tune with what you want out of life – your positive vision – and keep moving towards that.  And by God, if you’re not living life FULLY right here and now, start doing it. Ebola or not, one day you WILL be dead. It happens to the best of us 🙂

    Morgan

  • Want Happiness and Productivity? Get to that Core! (video)

     

    Isn’t it funny how the more we try to have control — swatting at negative emotions and demands like buzzing flies — the more frustrated we get and the less in control we feel? That’s because when we’re reacting, we’re giving up control. We’ve decided to let an outside force set our agenda for us.

    Now, that doesn’t mean we should stick our fingers in our ears and go through life singing “I can’t hear you” to anything unpleasant that comes along. Control isn’t about tuning out the un-fun stuff or having things go our way. It’s about getting in touch with what we do want. That takes practice, and patience, and relaxed time spent thinking about what you want to be doing and why.

    Turn off your phone, give your “glowing rectangles” a break, and listen for that voice inside that says “Wouldn’t it be awesome if?” The more frequently you listen for it, the louder it gets. Pretty soon, you’ll feel inspired to do something about it. The steps you take from there are your most powerful.

    That’s being proactive.

  • Gag Me With a Bucketload of Stupidity

    Gag Me With a Bucketload of Stupidity

    Once, a long time ago in a place not so far away, universities and research institutions were the shining beacon of hope for our society.

    They were going to cure cancer.

    They were helping send us to the moon.

    They were discovering penicillin and the polymerase chain reaction (which allows us to sequence DNA).

    We had high hopes, so we invested in them heavily.

    We believed in them, and they in turn opened their doors to our masses.

    Giving nearly every kid the opportunity for a college education, we thought our future was bright.

    Then something happened.

    I’m not sure exactly what it was. I can come up with some smart-sounding theories, but in the end they matter not.

    The only thing that matters is where we’re at, and what to do about it.

    As our colleges and universities go, so goes society. As much as I love entrepreneurial activities and my own current independence from academia, we as a society need these institutions to carry forth the great intellectual traditions that have led to so much advancement for our species.

    So, let’s start with the present tense. Let’s look at two examples of the lunacy that seems to be spreading throughout our halls of higher ed.

    Example 1: Get Grants Or Be Fired

    “If you don’t get at least one federal grant in the next six months, you’ll be out on the street, jobless, sweeping floors at the local burger joint… so get your butt in gear writing grants!”  This is a proclamation handed down by an administrator to more than one researcher I know lately. In each one of these cases, the recipients of the proclamation were already working blood, sweat, and tears on grants, but that is not enough. The proclaimer felt like adding some pressure to make sure that the “lazy” researcher in question got the message loud and clear.

    A bit of background for my non-academic readers. When you get hired to do research, you are expected to go out and get money to pay for your research. This usually comes in the form of grant money from various federal and state agencies, along with foundations.  Grants come in all shapes and sizes, from small $5,000 grants to buy a piece of equipment to some that pay as much as $2,000,000 per year or more to support a whole team doing research on a topic like cancer.

    It’s always been a challenge to get grant funding. I remember back in the 1980’s when my father ran a science lab, how much he’d stress out about writing grant proposals – these thick stacks of paper justifying every little detail of a project that hadn’t happened yet. I’d see him up late at night and then up again early, with circles drawing under his eyes, as he’d finish up one of these things for submission.

    Yet, in the past few years, it’s become a whole new ballgame, kiddos. The new ballgame is definitely a pro’s only sport. For big grant-giving agencies like the National Institutes of Health, less than 1 in 10 proposals get funded. It takes months to hear back whether you’ll get funded or not, and if you get a rejection, reviewer’s comments are generally cryptic and don’t really help much.

    Throwing Young Faculty Into The Ring With Pro Fighters

    So here we have in one corner: new faculty who’ve never had grants before, never had any deep training in persuasive writing, being hired by big universities and thrown into the ring to duke it out.

    The all pervasive mantra is “just fight more fights!!!”

    As if getting knocked out and bloodied frequently is a substitute for real training. (It’s not).

    In the other corner, we have university administrators. They’re coming out of their corners with gloves swinging, sweat dripping, and a big hard-on for grant money. Their fight is driven by the mantra “we need more money to pay the bills! so YOU are going to fight, whether you’re prepared or not!”

    The bizarrely stupid thing about the threats I regularly hear lobbed at faculty over the need to get grants “or else” is that those doing the threatening are ignoring the very clear research that’s been done on human motivation.

    How to Motivate Workers in Modern Enterprises (or… Not)

    Dan Pink summarizes this in his book, Drive. If you put more pressure on people using a carrot and stick method, it works okay for simple mechanical tasks like assembly line work. You can use the carrot and stick to get more “productivity” out of those “damn workers.”

    BUT: If you use this kind of punishment and reward scenario on people involved in complex cognitive tasks that involve creative thinking, forget it. The more you incentivize, the more you get just the opposite of what you want. It takes people longer to solve those big problems that need solving.

    So let me riddle you this: Is writing a grant proposal an assembly-line job, or a complex cognitive task requiring creative thinking?

    If you answered “assembly-line job” you joined the chorus of those misguided souls who think that grant proposals can be written by robots (robots that happen to be of the skin and bones variety). Last I checked, nobody has been able to build a grant writing robot.

    No, grant writing – like much of what professionals and business owners do, involves complex thinking.  It can’t be carrot-and-stick’d into happening faster or better.

    The Creation of a Robot Monoculture

    As a result of this pressure, there’s a sort of “natural selection” that’s going on in these institutions. It is weeding out the creative thinkers, the innovators, and the future Nobel laureates to produce a monoculture of pseudo-robots that follow orders blindly and manage to just scrape by though a process of sacrificing family time, sleep time, and even their own health in the name of satisfying the hungry dollar-sucking institutions they work for.

    Sadly, there seems to be a nearly limitless supply of such robots, so that when one of the monoculture succumbs to cancer, another steps up to gladly take the place of the fallen ones.

    Yet, lest ye think this is sustainable, think again.  As has been discovered with agricultural crops, growing monocultures is a fragile situation. It’s susceptible to breakage if anything unexpected happens, such as pests or bad weather. In academia, the precise nature of future shocks can’t be predicted, but we can know for sure that they will happen. The unexpected is part of life, everywhere and every time.

    I am honestly sad for these administrators. I think at least some of them are well-intentioned. But they find themselves in a situation that requires true leadership and vision, without the skills and tools to exhibit leadership and vision. So they resort to carrots, sticks, and “incentives” as a substitute. And they don’t realize that they are doing the opposite of leading in the process. True leaders inspire (think of MLK, Nelson Mandela, Mahatma Ganhdi, etc…). False leaders cajole.

    So let’s consider the second scenario, again from a recent interaction within academia:

    Example 2: The Only Real Way To Succeed Is To Join an R1

    “You’re about to get your PhD, and to be a success you have to take a serious research job at an R1 institution. If you take that teaching job you want from that small college, you’ll be relegated forever to that third-tier, stuck in the backwaters as a nobody. So, c’mon, ignore your distaste for the direction research is going in the field, get with the program, do some fundable research, and start applying for real jobs at real universities!”

    I remember the cliques in high school. If you weren’t part of the clique, you were a “nobody.” Well, I wasn’t part of the popular cliques – the jocks, the cheerleaders, the A-students. I have yet to return to a high school reunion, but I may do so someday to see what has happened to all those folks.

    I suspect this: that 1) I earn more money than most of them; 2) I have more free time than most of them; 3) I spend more quality time with my family than most of them; 4) I am doing what I love unlike most of them; 5) I am having a positive impact in the world unlike most of them; and 6) that almost none of them has all of 1-5 going on in their lives. (I know this because it seems like less than 1 in 1,000 that has all this going for them).

    No, I didn’t get to where I am by listening to the “advice” of the cliques. It’s a damn good thing that I never was really a part of one, so I got spared that kind of mind-numbing groupthink.

    Sadly, much of this cliquey groupthink has now infected academia – and our world. If you’re not part of the “R1 clique” you are a “nobody.” (R1 refers to the exclusive group of 50 or so top-tier, well funded research universities, including those brand names we’ve all heard). Forget what you’re good at, your individual talents and contributions and join us in the  “IN” group.

    OMG. Gag me with a spoon! No, wait… gag me with a bucketful of stupidity!

    It’s not that the individuals in a clique aren’t smart. Sometimes they are. But groupthink is almost never smart. So when one subsumes her own smartness to the groupthink, it produces an immediate 30 point drop in IQ.

    That’s what is happening in this highly toxic advice that someone gave this soon-to-be-minted new Doctoral researcher.

    What’s so sad about this groupthink-spawned advice to our erstwhile PhD is that I think these folks giving the advice actually believe that there could be nothing better than life at an R1 research institution. They seem to actually believe that the sacrifices of family, free time, and health are worth it. They seem to believe that the constant treadmill of robotic grant writing and “publish or perish” is just a fact of life. Worse still, they actually believe that the current funding system leads to the best research being done, when it is just the opposite. The groupthink that happens in grant review committees usually produces a lowest-common-denominator approach to research progress that stifles creativity and innovation (how else can you explain the billions spent on cancer and no big cures to date?)

    No. It is a case of the blind leading the young off the cliff into oblivion.

    Do. Not. Listen. To. Groupthink.

    Listen to what’s right for you. That should be the only criterion for any decision, ever. Sadly, we’ve programmed ourselves to listen to others, to follow orders, and to totally ignore our inner wisdom and intelligence.

    And people ask me why I left academia… maybe a picture is emerging?

    When this kind of terrible advice being doled out to our students is par for the course, it’s a sign that the system is more and more bent on breeding clones instead of creative, innovative researchers who could actually make a difference in the world.

    It is truly sad, this state of affairs that’s represented by these two brief glimpses I’ve shared with you here.

    It’s sad because I have so many friends and colleagues still in the system, trying to survive with some sense of self retained. It’s sad that it’s getting harder and harder to do.

    The solution

    I could write a lot about all the things that need to change, but in this case I think simplicity is the best policy.

    The solution is the epitome of simple: we need leaders to stand up and step up, facing off with these negative forces, and saying “enough is enough! no more stupidity will be allowed in our halls of higher education! let’s start living sane lives again!”

    I saw this recently happen with a PhD student whom I inspired, who then went and stood up to a borderline-abusive supervisor.

    I don’t think unions are the answer.  The only time, ever, that unions have made a difference is when they have strong, inspiring leaders. But unions bring lots of baggage with them – including the very groupthink that’s part of the problem. You can’t fix a problem by substituting it with another equal (or worse) problem!

    Great leadership is a solution, always and every time throughout human history.

    I just got an email from someone I have worked with. This person decided to walk away from a faculty job next year – disgusted by what’s been happening. (Like most sane people are).

    While I applaud the decision for the person’s own sake, it is sad that some of the best and brightest are choosing to leave rather than to stand up as leaders to fix the problem. (mea culpa, I am one of those who left, because I didn’t know how to stand up to it at the time – I didn’t have the skills needed).

    These academic institutions are like a car on the road that’s just run out of gas, and which is now coasting on momentum end elevation gained during better times. If we don’t start seeing some real leadership, these institutions will soon run out of momentum and come to a jerky, shaking halt.

    Are you ready to step up and be a leader, be a visionary? 

    Because if our instituions of higher learning are going to live up to our belief in them as great institutions, then things need to change. We need leaders who are willing to step up and take risks, change the way the model operates, and CREATE a vision of an institution that is not just spewing out well-trained robots who join the existing rat race of chasing money.

    And if these institutions fall, then what does that mean for the rest of us? Where will intellectual traditions be fostered? What will we look towards for the future of progress?

    If you aren’t willing to step up, then you are participating in a slow-but-sure death of the system. Rest assured that things will get worse before they get better.

    If you are, be prepared for a difficult but rewarding journey of change and struggle. Leadership is never easy, yet it is the only thing that brings true success. It is leading by example, leading with love, leading with a vision and passion. If you choose this path, you may be like a real-life Frodo Baggins, with dark forces amassed against you – but you will ultimately prevail.

    Dr. Morgan Giddings
    Dr. Morgan Giddings

     

     

  • The BIG Lie!

    You’ve been fed a big lie.

    The lie goes thusly.

    You must study hard in school (creativity killer #1).  You must get good grades (creativity killer #2). You must listen to teachers (creativity killer #3). You must do what you’re told (creativity killer #4).

    Then, you must get into a great college or university by taking a standardized test (creativity killer #5).

    Once you’re in, you study (#6), listen well (#7), and get more good grades (#8). You don’t talk back to the professor (#9 and #10).⁠1  You accumulate student debt (#11).

    You graduate. Yay!

    The world is your oyster!

    You get the house and the mortgage (#12), the car with the car loan (#13).

    You find a job (Creativity killer #14-20 as you subject yourself to the every whim of your employer). Yippe doodle dandy! Money!

    You work hard to get promoted into the corner office-someday – and you schmooze with the boss (#21).  You listen to the gurus that tell you all you need to do is work harder and smarter (#22).

    You keep going down that path, blissfully unaware at all the ways in which you’re killing your creativity, bit by bit, until you hit retirement.

    Wohooo! Retirement. You escaped creativity killers #1-#42 with your body (but not your spirit) intact.

    You get to roam the country in your RV, doing whatever you want, whenever you want.  If you’re one of the lucky ones, you visit a few tropical beaches, and sip a few margaritas while watching the 20-somethings walk by in skimpy bathing suits.

    Soon, boredom sets in. Unless you find some other outlet for your creative energies, and quickly, the statistics aren’t on your side. You’ll be dead soon.

    It is not a path to happiness. 

    It is not even a path to real success.

    A lot of people, if asked what success is, they’d look hungrily at millionaires and billionaires on TV, and say: “that’s success!”

    I’ve met some of those people who have made millions (and even one who’s made billions).

    Take, for example, internet marketer Frank Kern.  His story – which he sometimes tells at events, is a rags-to-riches saga.  He went from broke and flooded out of his trailer home to generating millions of dollars in an online business.

    He talks about how – after generating his first million or so – he was at his most miserable ever.

    He had to go on a journey of self discovery to find his way to more happiness – after becoming a millionaire.

    Money helps – but it does not create happiness.  It does not create success.

    Success in life is more than just getting the stable job, the decent salary, and the white picket fence.

    Success is about living in the exciting flow of life.  Success is about having an impact on the people you meet.  Success is about changing the world in positive ways.  Success is about having enough money so that you’re not struggling constantly just to survive.

    Yet, if you’ve followed the path laid forth by tradition, you may well be headed in a very different direction.

    How did it come to be this way?  We’ll discuss that in the next post.

    Meanwhile, if you want to learn more about how to optimize your “creativity pipeline” to help you find balance in your business and life, go sign up here.

     

    1 Oddly, I often talked back to my professors. Maybe that’s why I became one, so I could experience what it was like to deal with a cantankerous rabble rouser like myself!